Twenty years at the helm

Fall 2024

By Brian R. McMahon

Breezing along in my new boat in 2004, I never thought that I’d still be enjoying En Garde! 20 years later. As the fifth sloop I’ve owned, En Garde! was the boat I always wanted, and my family and friends have enjoyed our time onboard. There haven’t been any death-defying voyages around the Horn, only New England cruising alone or in club cruises with friends.

Over two decades, En Garde! has worn several flags: the Jubilee YC, MA Boating and Yacht Clubs Association and Pelagic Sailing Club burgees. In addition, she has flown the US Coast Guard Auxiliary patrol ensign when participating in regatta patrols for the annual Gloucester Schooner Race, and for the Boston Harbor Tall Ships Parade of Sail.

Held on the Labor Day weekend, the Schooner Festival attracts two-masters from all over the East Coast.

En Garde! also assisted the Coast Guard during the 2017 Parade of Sail into Boston Harbor by clearing a path for all of the visiting barques, brigs, brigantines, ships, sloops, cutters, ketches, yawls, schooners, snows and pinks. When underway on Coast Guard patrol orders, En Garde! became a federal vessel, much like the Coast Guard’s other “sailboat”, USCG Barque Eagle.

US Coast Guard Auxiliary personnel are volunteers who are willing to donate life’s most valuable resource — time — to help the Coast Guard ensure safety on local waters. They undergo training for leading and crewing on boats owned by Auxiliarists, who offer them for service to the Coast Guard. In addition, Auxiliarists offer vessel safety checks, and teach boating safety courses.

My crew patrolled the southern side of the patrol route along the south channel into Boston harbor. It was an impressive display of sailing ships of all types and from many different countries. Some were rebuilt originals like Eagle, ex-Horst Wessel, built in Hamburg in 1936 to train Kriegsmarine officers, and taken by the U.S. as a war prize after WWII. Eventually, this ship needed to be totally rebuilt, because it had no watertight compartmentation and this was embarrassing when the Coast Guard required ships taking passengers for hire to be compartmented. Other sailing ships in the parade like Fame of Salem and Thomas E. Lannon were recently constructed to meet Coast Guard standards of compartmentation, stability and fire protection.

Given the spelling of the boatbuilder’s brand (Sabre) and my choice of names (En Garde!) for my 386, it’s no surprise that our boat hosts an annual party in mid-July for cheese-eating champagne poppers like us, at which time we run a large tricolor up to the spreader.

Napoleon’s cavalry officers perfected the art of “sabrage”, using the single bold stroke of a saber to open a bottle of champagne. Since bubbly is bottled at 90 psi, this can be risky, and sabrage does require some advance preparation to be a safe spectacle.

Surprisingly, a saber isn’t really the best choice to open champagne, because they have a long, curved blade that is rather delicate. A meaty cutlass pattern is better, and is certainly more nautical. For a birthday, my French sister gave me a special “sommelier’s sword” that has a blunt cutting edge that’s designed to take the punishment of many Bastille Day parties.

An alert reader may wonder why En Garde’s hull appears to be different shades of red in the previous pictures. She was Awlgripped in Cabernet by the dealer, and when that became tatty, she was stripped down to the gelcoat and refinished in Merlot, a darker shade of red, in 2013 and again in 2023 when the cabin, deck and cockpit had all their gelcoat cracks routed out, filled in and then refinished. A subsequent winter spa season in Manchester resulted in the toe rail stripped down to bare teak and coated with six applications of Cetol, as well as the restoration of the cabin sole.

I bought hull #2 after the hull had been molded in white but before much work had proceeded.

Martha and I made three trips to Maine to watch our new boat being built and we enjoyed talking to the craftsmen and admiring their workmanship. Even the fiddles surrounding the tables and sinks weren’t miter-cut teak; they were gracefully formed from thin strips of cherry that were steam bent in jigs and then bonded together.

The dealer had been required to buy a 386 to exhibit at the 2004 Boston Boat Show when I inquired if they could still order either a Sabre 34 or Sabre 38. “No, they are both out of production now, but you can jump in and buy the 386 and customize it to suit your requirements. We can even Awlgrip the hull in Cabernet for you here in Manchester. Or, you can wait until it’s finished and buy it at the boat show, where it will have a white hull, a wing keel and a flat-screen TV.” I knew exactly what I wanted but there was one problem: no one — not even Sabre people — had ever sailed a 386, and hull #1 had just been completed. The dealer suggested that I visit the factory to see how well Sabres are built.

And also visit the 386’s naval architect (Jim Taylor) in Marblehead to describe the expected sailing characteristics. He explained that he had designed a well-balanced boat that would perform competently on any point of sail, have no dangerous flaws that would cause an emergency, and that the 386 would also be a boat that is stylish and comfortable.

Since I wanted the deep fin keel if I ordered a 386, even though the draft was 6’10”, I asked him how it would differ from a shoal draft (two feet less draft) wing keel version that he drew of the same boat. “First, we add an extra 1,000 pounds of lead to the wing keel model to bring back some of the stability that’s lost. This makes the boat slower, but the wings act as flopper-stoppers in choppy seas, so you think you’re on a bigger boat.” I asked how much more leeway a shoal draft model makes than a deep fin version, and he said that the wing keel cost 3⁰ – 5⁰ of additional downwind motion. In practical terms, on a straight 19-mile southerly run from Marblehead to Scituate under a southwest breeze, the wing-keel 386 would be one mile further offshore . . . if it didn’t have that additional half ton of ballast. Well, I hate to be the last one to moor, so my decision was confirmed.

As built, the boat is swift, elegant and graceful under sail.

We’ve made many cruises aboard En Garde!, but our most memorable trip was to Sandy Bay in Rockport, Mass., in 2022. That was the time when Martha and I got to sail both to and from My Happy Place. Experienced sailboat cruisers know that half the time they travel to a destination, they need to be under power. No wind, too much wind, or wind on the nose usually make this a reality.

Ever since we joined Jubilee YC in 1978, we have made an annual visit to Rockport and anchored in Sandy Bay, if only to maintain our proficiency, but more importantly to enjoy its beauty.

The bay is a popular stopping point for boats cruising north and south to Maine in the summer and features a sandy beach.

If you planned ahead and have a dinghy, you can take in a jazz, classical or folk concert at the Shalin Liu Performance Center.

But it’s the evening townscape, which looks like nothing has changed in 150 years, that is most attractive. Here’s the sunset view of Bearskin Neck to the east:

But then you are challenged by the sunset view to the western shore of the mooring area.

Rockport doesn’t offer its spectacular views easily. In an easterly wind, the anchorage area is uncomfortable; in a northerly blow it is treacherous. But in a southerly breeze it is delightful.

The next morning, Martha and I weighed anchor and sailed home. We passed between the Londoner daymark just off Thatcher Island light and the shore and headed east toward Gloucester and then Beverly.

That day we got a special treat. As we approached the Gloucester Harbor approach, all of the 2022 Schooner Race contestants were exiting and we got to sail in company with many of them as they set sail and prepared to start the race.

A wondrous sight for any sailor, it was also the perfect conclusion to our cruise. After two decades sailing En Garde! I’ll leave the final words to Gilbert and Sullivan:

“Oh, we sail the ocean blue / And our saucy ship’s a beauty . . .”

Brian and Martha McMahon live in Burlington, Mass., 20 miles northwest of Boston. He fell in love with the ocean in 1972 while serving in the U.S. Navy on USS Fox, a destroyer based in San Diego, Calif. Back on the U.S. East Coast, Brian and Martha rented sailboats on Boston’s North Shore before purchasing their first sloop, Cyrano, a Bristol 19 Corinthian in 1976. Brian is a Life Member of Jubilee YC and a 47-year veteran of the U.S. Coast Guard Auxiliary.