Sensations at sea

Legally blind, Ricardo Leon has trouble making out people’s faces. He can’t see out of his right eye at all because of a detatched retina, but the sun and ocean breeze feels good on his face.

The Anaheim resident manned the wheel of a 43-foot Beneteau 430 sailboat in bustling Newport Harbor Saturday.

“It’s great when the boat is in the ocean and they turn off the motor and you can hear the ocean and the wind and the birds,” said Leon.

More than 30 sailboats from local sailing clubs teamed up Saturday for Sail for the Blind and Visually Impaired. The annual event lets blind and visually impaired people from across Southern California experience a day of sailing.

Costa Mesa resident Bonnie Gibson began Sail for the Blind and Visually Impaired with a group of 12 people on a 40-foot boat in 1990. Over the last 18 years, the event has ballooned to include about 200 blind and visually impaired participants this year from across the region and hundreds of volunteers. The event is organized each year by the Women’s Ocean Racing Sailing Assn. and the American Legion Newport Harbor Post 291.

“The most rewarding part of it is to see the pleasure everyone gets out of it,” Gibson said. “They can’t see, but they can still feel the wind and the sun and hear the waves.”

Capt. Heinz Rose of Marina Sailing Newport Beach says you don’t have to see to become a good sailor.

“After a while, you get so good, you don’t need to see — you can hear when something isn’t right,” the captain said, as he adjusted the mainsail of the Beneteau Saturday.

Rose, who has volunteered for the event for several years, said he enjoys the happiness it brings to the participants.

“The faces, the looks on their faces make it worth it,” he said.

Rose’s passengers on Beneteau 430 Saturday couldn’t see the sea lions lounging on the bell buoy at the mouth of the harbor, but they could smell them as they basked lazily in the sun.

A pod of dolphins approached the boat as it sailed out into the open ocean, leaping and frolicking in the sailboat’s wake.

Boat passenger Anna Garzya yearned to see the dolphins and strained to hear them as their bodies slapped the water.

“We miss so much being blind,” she said. “Just looking at the water would be nice, but you visualize things in your mind.”

One passenger jokingly asked the captain if he had ever seen a mermaid.

“I have,” Rose exclaimed. “But you have to have special eyes to see them — you can see anything if you imagine it.”

BRIANNA BAILEY may be reached at (714) 966-4625 or at brianna.bailey@latimes.com.