“A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step.” - Lao Tzu

My idea, this time, wasn’t to sail a thousand miles (kilometers? maybe more accurate for our world). Nevertheless, working some time for a sail into my routine required quite a bit of schedule massaging. The end result was a cruise that, while mostly short and straightforward and in actuality, not very far… was still immensely satisfying, and actually wound up revealing some truths about cruising to me. At least, I think they’re truths. They certainly seem to make sense.

I knew of a port some distance to the west of Mowry, having put in there a few times in the past when sailing around Sansara (the ‘Southern Continent,’ if you prefer, but I like placenames and like to use them when available, and tend to coin them when not). It is in the Benicia region, which is only five provinces (sims? regions?) to the west. Still in the local neighborhood, as it were — indeed, even walking there wouldn’t have been too much of a stretch. I’ve walked further.

My intended course would take me, in my Trudeau Sojourner Amaya, from the Scafell stone dock on Mowry Bay, around the headland of Mare into the Nuba Gulf, and then southwest along the coast until I reached Benicia. There, I knew I could tie up for a while at Dyka’s Marina, a small cluster of piers platformed just off the coast. I’ve stopped there before, when I was sailing to Cecropia, and to Da Boom. It’s a good place to stop and stretch one’s legs. Then perhaps I’d head back a little bit on the east to the docks owned by Savonah Madonna and explore the countryside.

It can be rewarding to plan a grand tour… and really, who sane would circumnavigate the globe without having a plan? But there’s no set limit, large or small, on the size of your plan. Even “I want to see what’s down that river” is valid, if you want it to be, if you’re just out to go somewhere, anywhere, and see what’s there. The only real excuse we need for cruising somewhere is having a boat and water.

Sailing to Benicia and back was enough of a plan for me. Indigo was busy and would be unavailable to act as first mate and photographer and spitfire, so I would be doing this myself. But that’s fine, really. Sightseeing is about what you see, after all. I unhooked from the mooring ball and motored west along the Mowry docks, before turning north, raising sail, and leaving the bay. I knew somewhere up on the hill was Saxxon, toiling in his shop. The docks and clubhouse and village were quiet.

Mare is a province that sticks out a little bit into the Nuba Gulf, and essentially divides Mowry Bay from the rest of the water. It’s a bit less crowded and quieter than the town of Selby to the south, and home to a few magnificent mansions that must both have an incredible view of the bay and gulf, as well as have cost a fortune. The corner, however, is also fairly treacherous… the bay is shallow close to the coast, and fraught with the whirlpools of a four way sim corner — fortunately, a happy green can stands sentinel at the corner, and staying well to the east and north of it proves safe. The winds down the bay, and indeed most of the water, were from the north. This had put me sailing along at a nice close-hauled clip leaving the bay, but onto a beam reach after the can. I didn’t want to rocket off into the afternoon sky, as I knew Amaya would let me if I let her. I wanted to take things at a leisurely pace. I let the sail out a bit, and instead of a thundering gallop across the sea, I was rewarded to a nice stroll.

The whole west and north coasts of the Gulf are riddled with rivers and channels, many navigable, that lace most of the northern regions of Sansara. The south, however, has only one… the river that flows from the inland Adriatic through Orwood and Mallard and into the gulf. That’s a fun cruise on its own, and in fact the course of the first cruise I ever took after learning to sail. But it’s also a travel for another time, as the Adriatic region itself is host to countless sights, and best I let it pass by for now. I smiled at the towers flanking the mouth of the Mallard River, and sailed on past the wooded hillside that is Edgerley.

Rather than following the coast religiously, I opted to cut across the portion of Nuba Gulf known as Okinu, watching the shore drift further away to port, and then slowly creep back. At some point the wind had shifted to be out of the west, and I’d found myself once more sailing closer to the wind heading southwesterly as I was; with the increase in speed, the forests of Benicia were dead ahead almost before I knew it, and I headed up a little to drop sail and motor the rest of the way in to Dyka’s Marina.

Dyka’s Marina is in the absolute northwest of the waters that could be considered part of Benicia, and is basically a wooden platform just off the coast with two long piers sticking out to the north. While I was there, I noted a Defender, as well as a collection of other yachts, as I listened to the lazy chugging of the lawnmower engine just behind the cockpit. I picked a vacant spot at the tip of the east pier and tied up.

Here is one of the first truisms of cruising in Second Life: you can’t go everywhere. It’s a sad fact. Lots of places in the world are private, restricted, chains below the waterline keeping out any intrepid explorers. Further, some of the places you may reach and drop anchor, the authorities are waiting to immediately impound your boat and won’t let you launch another one. Fortunately, Dyka’s Marina is not like that. Yes, the authorities are watching, and will probably haul your boat out if you leave it alone long enough (autoreturn IS enabled, but there’s a 5 minute period before it happens). Fortunately, you -are- allowed to launch your boat here (rezzing is open to all).

This comes to another truism of cruising in our world: things take up space. Specifically, your yacht takes up prims; prims that otherwise belong to the owner of whatever parcel you’re moored in. Exercise your best judgement here when you disembark to look around. What if you lost connection? Would you want someone leaving a large amount of prims in your yard, so to speak, even if the prims in question are a beautiful, finely crafted sailing vessel? Well… maybe you would. But most wouldn’t. Even if the parcel has all the prims in the world available (you can see this by clicking on About Land for where you are); even if you’re going to “be right back” — see what you can about hauling it out of the water. It’s the neighborly thing to do.

The advantage with the ports of call I visited in Benicia is: they’re explicitly friendly to sailors. I had a chance to talk to Savonah a few days after my cruise, and we discussed both her estate and Dyka’s Marina. As it happens, Savonah built Dyka’s Marina just north of her house (which is directly to the south of the Marina), so that Dyka Pavlova (who, incidentally, is Savonah’s girlfriend) can have a place nearby.

Sadly, Savonah is of the opinion that this sort of charitability towards sailors is rare in our world. I have yet to see if she’s right, or not. Certainly, there is enough restricted water and imposing structures along many of our waterfronts that, if not necessarily uninviting, are at least generally aesthetically disquieting. She, and to a slightly lesser degree of agressiveness Dyka (who has been known to shoot on sight anyone who tries to enter the locked room at her marina, or who is generally rude and unsociable), are proud to have such an anchorage that not only welcomes sailors, also permits rezzing and has a generous return time. She even has windsetters on the property giving winds from the north.

After poking around Dyka’s Marina for a bit, and staring at the tantalizingly lush woodlands on the hills behind Savonah’s house, I decided to push off from the dock and motor Amaya east along the shore to Savonah’s docks. On this particular stretch of shoreline you can see what Savonah means by a welcoming anchorage: there is a secluded beach here, and plenty of places to relax and enjoy the view… there’s even a protected swimming area and swim-up bar, all clustered at the edge of the water on the curve of land before you reach her docks.

Savonah’s public docks are built (probably not coincidentally) on the same general layout as Dyka’s Marina: two north-south piers side by side, providing a mostly safe haven for vessels.

I say mostly, however, because of the wreck at the bottom of the sea here. I can only imagine what catastrophe must have befallen that unfortunate mariner, to find their boat on the seafloor. Either way, it appears it might be a stellar place for a wreck dive, if one were into that sort of thing. Jellyfish weird me out, though.

Personally, I’m much more of a wandering through the woods sort of cat. I love looking at the sky through the trees. Fortunately, most of Savonah’s property is still pristine woodland, with a fascinating assortment of woodland creatures dwelling in the clearings. None of them offered much comment on what it was like to live there; perhaps I spoke a different dialect, but they certainly seemed happy enough, and didn’t mind me moving past them and up the hill. The sun was sliding further down the sky and I wanted to catch the sunset at least before I set sail back to Mowry.

There is a lot that can be seen from aboard your boat. If that wasn’t true, what would be the point of sailing a cruise at all? Just as rewarding, though, is what you’ll find when you tie up and come ashore to look around. I love the trees. Even though it was a bit of a climb to the top of the hill, and even though the other side of the hill was covered in houses and suburban sprawl like most of the rest of the world… Savonah has made her little corner worth visiting, again and again (in fact, in truth, this was not the first time I’d been there). I made it to the crest of the ridge in time to catch the last rays of the sun fall below the horizon, and took a picture of the Gulf. I think that one might go up in my living room.

It was definitely dark by the time I made it back down to the docks and motored Amaya back out to sea, watching Benicia fade into the distance behind me. I didn’t have to go home, of course. I didn’t have to have a fixed plan on where to go. A long voyage isn’t the purpose of this cruise, though, like I said. This is the baby steps cruise, a little jaunt around the nautical neighborhood, so to speak. I didn’t even really have to have a destination, come to think of it… could have just sailed out and around and taken in the sights. But I wanted to come to Benicia to prove a point, that there are indeed at least places in the world that welcome us, and want us to be entertained while ashore, if we take the time to find them.

So where to next? Maybe the channels north of the Nuba. Maybe down the Mallard River to the Adriatic. Who can say? There are always possibilities. Maybe (to modify something my dad used to say) I’ll just get in a boat and sail until I run out of water.

Until next time… fair winds, and following seas.

Places Visited
Dyka’s Marina (Benicia 22,206,21)
Owner: Dyka Pavlova
Autoreturn: yes, 5 minutes
Rezzing: yes

Savonah’s Estate (Benicia 227,214,24)
Owner: Savonah Madonna
Autoreturn: yes, 10 minutes
Rezzing: yes

Photo Album
Photographs from this cruise may be viewed in their original size at http://s263.photobucket.com/albums/ii142/elishakitty/Mowry%20-%20Benicia/

Navigation Chart
forthcoming