Marie Humphrey, of family Kayak Adventure Center in San Diego, recently inquired about a paddler to replace her for escort duty on a Catalina crossing swim-- I volunteered and was accepted, after extensive screening and coaching by David Clark of the La Jolla Cove Swim Club and Catalina Channel Swimming Federation. He is an endurance swimmer in his own right and has honchoed many such events, including this one.

On Monday night, 10 August, we all met aboard "Bottom Scratcher" our mother ship, in Long Beach Harbor. I arrived early to beat the traffic and explored the rough and tumble port neighborhood. We first headed ashore for dinner, but detoured to see the Queen Mary and the Russky sub berthed next to her. We had an excellent dinner at the Reef restaurant next door.

A little bit about the cast of characters (Mostly David's words):

Hi George,

Thanks again for your support of Kathleen's swim. You melded into the team and really helped make it work. Here's the roster:

Kathleen Wilson - swimmer She's 41, the mother of 2, principal harpist for the Charleston Symphony Orchestra in Charleston, South Carolina. Swam around Key West in 1997, around Manhattan in 1999 and across the English Channel in 2001.

Andrew Wunderley - coach and paddler. He's Kathleen's swim coach in Charleston

Dr. Scott Richards - pace swimmer, physician. A former nationally ranked swimmer, he lives in San Marcos, CA.

Greg Elliot - captain. He's the owner / operator of Bottom Scratcher Charter Dive Boat. Former Marine, avid bagpiper, he has been piloting for Catalina swims since 1991. The Bottom Scratcher and her sister ship the Sand Dollar were originally owned by Bill Johnson, one of the founders of San Diego Divers Supply.

The boat is named after a diving club called the Bottom Scratchers in San Diego; they claimed to be the first diving club in the U.S. (1933). Back before the availability of fins, you had to catch 3 abalone on one breath-hold dive and catch a horn shark (small harmless shark) barehanded to join the Bottom Scratchers.

I don't have the last names of Darrell, the second captain, or Bobby, the deckhand. They were quite competent and accommodating.

Steve Dockstader - paddler and observer. Steve has been an active member of the La Jolla Cove Swim Club for many years and has paddled on many Catalina crossings and swum on several relays across the Catalina Channel, in addition to many other swims in many other places. He is one of the founders and principal organizers of the Tour of Buoys race, a 5 mile ocean race held annually in La Jolla Cove. The 2004 race was last Sunday; the 2005 race will be a United States Masters Swimming (USMS) National Championship.

Peri Coady - paddler. Peri is a longtime member of the La Jolla Cove Swim Club and has paddled for swimmers in many races.

George Miller - paddler. George is a very active California Kayak Friends member, who has participated in and/coordinated events, including crossings, camping trips, day touring, surfing, rock gardening and whitewater. This was his first escort gig.

Suzanne Pentis-Moore - paddler. Suzanne is a member of the San Diego Kayak Club and has paddled on several Catalina swims.

David Clark - observer and paddler. I'm a member of the La Jolla Cove Swim Club and the Catalina Channel Swimming Federation (CCSF). I've swum solos across the Catalina Channel, English Channel and other places. I've also swum on channel relays many times. I also coach swimmers, teach kayakers to escort swimmers and organize support crews for out-of-town swimmers who haven't got their own paddlers. I've been across the Catalina channel as a swimmer, coach, paddler or observer for the CCSF over 60 times.

You can find out more about the CCSF at www.swimcatalina.org

So, we got back to the Bottom Scratcher a little later than planned. By the time we got underway, it was well after 10 PM. I had ideas about getting some sleep, but didn't realize all the things that had to be done. First Capt. Greg conducted an orientation and explained the overall trip plan, made us familiar with the vessel and relevant operations we needed to know. The most complex knowledge we were entrusted with was the operation of the marine "heads," indispensable appliances at sea. The boat was designed to run non-stop to Cabo San Lucas and seemed very capable of doing so. Built of wood in 1969, she is well-maintained and recently repowered with heavy duty Cummins Diesels. She is rigged for diving, but can fish, cruise, shepherd swimmers and probably minesweep or run drugs if required.

It turned out that, except for a lack of radar, I had better navigation equipment aboard my 50 lb. kayak than anything that the 65 ton Bottom Scratcher had. They had no chartplotter, for example, instead sporting ancient LORAN and GPS boxes. Although it didn't present any hazards at all, Bottom Scratcher's equipment didn't allow Kathleen to minimize her COG (Course Over Ground). This caused a few minor system compatibility problems between the mother ship and one of the kayakers (guess which one.)

Then, David did his orientation talk on the swim route, rules, procedures and contingency plans. It was extremely thorough and well- thought out. I suggested some additional ideas, but Dave understandably wasn't keen to make any changes on the fly to a winning formula. The experience and knowledge of all the team members was quite evident from the discussion, before we even hit the water. It was important that we not do anything that might disqualify Kathleen.

There was a little confusion about the exact swim route. My original understanding was that Kathleen would start at Doctor's Cove on the Northwest coast of Catalina, just west of Emerald Bay, then land at Marineland on the PV Peninsula. Kathleen told me she was to start at Isthmus Cove. But, Dave made it clear that she would start out from Dr's Cove, which she did. Then, I heard that we would actually be landing at St. Vincente Park, not Marineland. So, I changed my GPS settings, but they ended up landing at Marineland anyway, exactly where I usually launch with Steve Brown & Co. to go rock gardening. I think that some of the out of town people were just not familiar with the place names, since they've done this drill before and no one was reported missing in action.

The team put Kathleen ashore at Dr.'s Cove, where she started her swim, at about 12:54 AM on Tuesday morning. In a couple of minutes, she swam by the Bottom Scratcher, at what appeared to be an unsustainable pace. I always thought of long distance swimming as long, slow strokes like those synchronized swimmers I smiled at during the Olympics. Kathy buzzed by us at and maintained a pace of up to 80 strokes a minute! I clocked her at over 1.8 knots for the trip, including stops (subject to official results confirmation).

We all stayed on deck during the initial excitement, while Kathleen was escorted by 2 kayakers in wide sit-on-tops. Being the junior member of the team, I was assigned to the below-the-graveyard shift much later.

Everyone seemed comfortable in a kayak and all except for me, were adept in escort duties, including feeding of the swimmer, which involved an elaborate dance with bottles of secret formula in net bags. A few minutes before rigidly scheduled feeding times, an escort would remove a bottle from the bag, tie a long cord to it, open it and pass it to Kathleen, who would quickly drink it, stretch a bit, sometimes briefly rest, then resume her journey with great energy.

She would take three strokes, breathe to the left, three more, then breathe to the right, with minimal kicking. Like ocean swimmers, her stroke was higher than a pool swimmer's, to cope with the waves. Swells and waves were minimal when we started in the shadow of the island, but gradually increased offshore. Because wind was light, there were only swells to contend with, which didn't go much over three feet.

Earlier, she told me that her training is strictly swimming in pools and waterways. She had done the English Channel and also circumnavigated Manhattan Island in 7 hours and something, quite a feat. Timing the tides perfectly, she was passing joggers at times.

Along the way, I found time to talk with most of the team members, crew and captain. I learned what I already knew from my two brothers in the business: being a charter boat owner is not usually a path to riches: you do it for the love of it and hope that it will continue to self-finance itself. The team members are/were all swimmers (and many other things-- Psychologists, harpists, trainers, undersea warfare experts, management consultants), except for me. When I swim, it's usually because I screwed up and find myself out of my kayak. Maybe they'll offer me lessons.

The stars/Milky Way looked fabulous in the blackness. It was just a little misty on the horizon, but we could immediately see Point Vincente light, a little to port of our destination, very clearly, so no fancy navigation was really needed. It got rather quiet, then a bit chilly up on deck. After making some preparations for later, I hit my bunk after 2 AM, with a request to David to wake me up 20 minutes before he wanted me for escort duty. So it ended up that I got only two hours of fitful sleep that night, since he woke me up sometime after 0400 and I was in a kayak sometime after 0430 until about 0930.

Although I was little sleepy and stiff initially, It felt good to get out on the water and paddle in the night. In theory, Kathleen was to guide on our kayaks, which in turn were to guide on the Bottom Scratcher, while also watching their heading to Pt Vincente. In practice, it wasn't so smooth. Sometimes the kayaks got too close or too far apart, squeezing Kathleen. Sometimes one got too far ahead or behind or too close or too far from the boat. Kathleen sometimes ran off course and nearly bumped into a kayak, since it's hard to see and concentrate while swimming head down. Once, she veered toward the mother ship. I tried to "herd" her away, but she didn't see me in time and almost ran into me. Dave shouted a warning and I sprinted ahead in time.

When I took over, I noticed that we were nearly .6 NM to port (left) of the course track (more if one considered the actual final destination). I planned to gradually correct this error over the rest of the journey, but Capt. Elliot had other ideas.

Fortunately, conditions were nearly ideal for the swim, with water temperature at 68 Fahrenheit, air in the 60's, light breeze, smooth swells, no whitecaps, no fog. Every 30 minutes, Dave would shout out feeding orders and we would stop briefly. The team would call out words of encouragement at that time. I imagine that this was Kathleen's only break in the monotony. When I've done long runs or paddles, I've often let my mind roam free, concentrate on certain thoughts, or play little games with distance, time, setting mini-goals. I'm not sure how she coped.

The sun came up and the mainland was clearly visible for hours before we landed. Kathleen couldn't see it for some time after we did.

I was surprised how fast the miles to go wound down. Before we knew it, we were only five miles from shore. During a feeding about then, Capt. Elliot played stirring tunes on his bagpipes and the group broke into chants of support, Kathleen really ripped along after that. Two of the guys dove in at various times to swim along with her, which she really appreciated. The pipes reverberated astoundingly loudly and vibrantly across the water. I thought I was hallucinating at first and couldn't tell whether the captain had donned his kilt.

The team was excited, because Kathleen was considerably exceeding expectations. Although the official goal was "just to finish," she was moving along to a faster drummer, or piper, as it were.

Paddling a few hours at under two knots is a heck of a lot easier than doing a fast Catalina round trip, like we did with Duane only months before. At three miles out, David replaced me in the kayak. Just before exiting, I asked him if he wanted to try my Nigel Foster paddle, which I had already untethered. He agreed. During the switch, the paddle fell over the side and we left it behind. Rather than stopping the boat, David asked me to hand paddle back to retrieve it, so I reentered the kayak and did so, turning it over to him shortly thereafter, along with my handheld VHF.

During the swim, coaches and observers constantly monitored all parameters, such as stroke rate, mileage, feeding, swimmer condition, weather, etc.

The crew's boat handling was superb, working with swimmers, kayaks and tender constantly over the side, approaching and leaving the vessel, keeping everything running right and properly aligned. They really knew what they were doing and ran a tight, safe ship. People/kayak/swimmer transfers were done via a launch tethered to the leeward side (starboard) near the stern. This was much simpler than using the stern swim step, since we were constantly underway.

Toward the end, the wind picked up and blew the waves up a bit. A shore party went ahead in a motorized launch to reconnoiter the best landing spots. They picked a site in the lee of the offshore rocks near where the path descends from the cliffs above, which is exactly where I had launched and landed about a dozen times before when a west swell was running. Captain Elliot knew enough not approach that treacherous, rocky coast. He told us that a previous group complained that they had worked with a more accommodating captain before, to which he replied, "but, where is he now, eh?"

Although the swells weren't too large, they were pounding hard on a rocky shore, which I knew well from a number of past "seal landings." Sometimes, members of our groups didn't make it and were sucked back down the rocks and pounded mercilessly.

Anyway, Kathleen and two others swam ashore at about 1030 and climbed up to satisfy regulations, getting cut up in the process. Fortunately, Dr. Scott Richards, our trip physician, was able to quickly patch them up satisfactorily.

We took them back aboard in very high spirits. Kathleen was looking rather tired and pale, but otherwise, none the worse for wear. She seemed pretty pleased with herself and the team. I suppose she could have done the whole thing without us, but the team, equipment and organization added greatly to safety, morale, performance and ability to verify the event.

It was a real experience to be part of such an achievement and to work with so many extraordinary, vital and positive-thinking people.

The Bottom Scratcher brought us back around the PV Peninsula, through the booming and rapidly growing harbor and to our berth at Pier C. The port area has been greatly expanded in the 25 years since I first explored it and is now one of the wonders of the world and a megahub of commerce.

I booked this gig on real short notice, so playing hooky crowded out my other work. So, I had to head back home soon after transferring Steve and Dave's kayaks.

We'll be escorting Gary Greenwood on a similar trip on 7 September.