New Boat 4 Sled

[sleddog]

PRO Emeritus Jan Brewer was here yesterday for a short visit enroute to her home in AZ. She had me in stitches with her stories of this year's 3 Bridge Fiasco, the biggest sailboat race in the U.S. For pure fun/dollar/person, the 3BF shines brightly.

For anyone who thinks SSS races just "happen," the opportunity to serve on Race Deck should not be missed. Good luck to BobJ, SSS Race Chairman for '13.

[AlanH]

PRO Emeritus Jan Brewer was here yesterday for a short visit enroute to her home in AZ. She had me in stitches with her stories of this year's 3 Bridge Fiasco, the biggest sailboat race in the U.S. For pure fun/dollar/person, the 3BF shines brightly.

For anyone who thinks SSS races just "happen," the opportunity to serve on Race Deck should not be missed. Good luck to BobJ, SSS Race Chairman for '13.

Thanks for stepping up to the plate, Bob!

[sleddog]

Our town is in mourning for the loss of two police officers in the line of duty, first ever in the history of Santa Cruz. The gun battle could be heard a mile away here at the harbor. The killer was known to us harbor rats, as he worked at the coffee shop by the Crows Nest.
RIP

[sleddog]

Huge kudos to Parker Diving Services for pulling the stolen Oyster 82, DARLING, off Rockaway Beach late last night. It could not have been easy rigging a bridle and towline in the dark, with surf breaking against the hull. Those guys are pros, and it's good to see pros in action.

WILDFLOWER was moored astern of DARLING in Friday Harbor for three days last summer. DARLING defines the word "yacht." http://www.interpacyachtcharters.com...rter/darling-2 At the time, she had three paid crew aboard. Things were spotless.

The question is how did the "senior citizen" perps get DARLING out of Sausalito Yacht Harbor and out the Gate at oh dark thirty?

DARLING was hauled this morning at Bay Marine in Richmond. Underwater damage is uncertain. But the rudder and prop are history. Looks like the "ship has come in" for Kim and crew at Bay Marine. ;-)

[BobJ]

While Kim had North Coast Yachts in Alameda (go back in this thread for some stories) I bought a faded, international orange-colored O'Day Daysailer that had been t-boned hard in a race. The cuddy was cracked in two on the centerline and there was another big crack through the sheer where it had been hit. I sailed it for awhile as-is but enjoyed the boat and decided to cherry it out. North Coast/Kim did the work and it came out of his shop looking flawless. He charged me less than he should have - the boat wasn't worth much to begin with and he "adjusted" for that. I also had a Banshee he probably built.

Kim moved on to become a yard manager at KKMI and when I bought the J/33, I tracked him down. TROUBADOUR had been raced hard and my first two yard bills were killers. Kim was patient with me despite my whining. It wasn't in his best interest but he advised me to consider down-sizing, even to a boat that could live on a trailer. I ultimately did, storing RAGTIME! on a trailer for several years. Kim also talked me out of buying a J/125 I really wanted, with the simple statement that my yard bills would easily quadruple.

I'm happy to see Kim (now at Bay Marine in Richmond) get a good-sized project, and I wish him well.
.

[sleddog]

Seeing DARLING in the surf reminded me of two beachings when I was a kid. In S.Cal it almost always pays to short tack the beach. My Dad was skippering Rhodes 33 #20, RUTH, off Balboa when they got in too close. A wave broke outside, and they were physically launched onto the beach. There's a classic photo of my Dad wading ashore with the spare battens. He could never tell me what was in his mind with that.

That afternoon, South Coast Shipyard's little black tug WALRUS pulled RUTH off the beach. She immediately sank. No problem, they just towed RUTH underwater, dragging her on the sand bottom for two miles back to Newport Harbor Entrance. Once in the breakwater, she was raised with a crane, pumped out, rerigged, some broken frames sistered, and racing a week later.

A similar thing happened as few years later. As a kid, I had a love affair with Starboats. I mean, they were so pretty. And fast. With dozens of things to adjust. Our fleet had two world champions in Ficker and Edler. Because I only weighed 120 pounds, only another kid named Tom Blackaller would take me as crew. And then only in the Bay, not in the ocean.

So I was left on the beach alot. I would walk along the ocean beach during regattas, following the Starboats just offshore, dreaming of the day I could skipper one.

During one of my reveries, Star #3497, MENEHUNE, came along and tacked out onto starboard. Just then, the set of the day from a distant Mexican Hurricane broke outside.
MENEHUNE was picked up, went vertical, and thrown backwards by the breaking wave. Her skipper bailed. Her crew took refuge under the deck.

To my amazement, MENEHUNE, her bow to the sky, landed on her transom at my feet. Her skipper swam ashore. Her crew appeared, wide eyed, out from under the foredeck.

MENEHUNE's transom was crushed. But the rudder and rest of the boat, except for the broken mast, was undamaged.

It didn't take long for a cherry picker A-frame truck to appear on the beach, pick up MENEHUNE, and take her across Balboa Blvd to her trailer.

My father bought MENEHUNE from the insurance company, and had Driscoll put a new (wood) transom on the boat. I have good memories of racing Star #3497 with my father as crew. We always gave the beach where both RUTH and MENEHUNE went ashore a little extra distance.

[Sleddog_sis]

I love these two stories, Skip, and I didn't know either of them (even though I'm Skip's sister). I guess being 9 years younger, I still need to catch up on some old lore. . . what Skip isn't telling you is that he was 12 or 13 when he got Star #3497. And he beat the tar off even folks a decade or 2 older than he was. I think he paced some of the practices for the World Stars in #3497 but was too young to race in the actual regatta, per the rules. Something like that. I was 4 or 5, so I don't know all the facts, for sure. He later graduated to #4497 (Shadow, a beautiful blue Star with gleaming wood/teak deck) and campaigned it all over the country, once he got his driver's license ;-).

Back to Darling - kudos to Kim and his yard!! I want to see pictures and hear stories. The boat went aground right where our daughter did a lot of surfing. Good thing the waves were not up yesterday.

[skatzman]

And how about the "perps" in the Darling episode putting the boat in some nice sand at Linda Mar. Instead of on the rocks at Pt San Pedro. And they picked a day with relativly small surf. There's a story here that is not being covered in the Chronicle.
And this story winds to Kim Desenberg....since the thread mentions his North Coast Yachts shop on Clement I remember that shop when I was sailing Madman Across the Water out of Alameda Marina. I thought it a great event when the Alameda Beltline would run trains right down the middle of Clement.

[BobJ]

Crossing Clement (like into Svend's) has always been like playing "Frogger" - even more so when switch engines w/boxcars were trundling along there. But I do miss the industrial side of things we used to live around. Now Alameda is all beemers and smartphones.

[sleddog]

The stolen and beached Oyster 82, DARLING, is gonna need some work. When I saw her yesterday at Bay Ship in Richmond, the floorboards were reportedly floating in a mixture of saltwater and diesel. The rudder and prop were extensively damaged, and the keel was loose. Nothing a million bucks can't fix. But the smell of diesel below is not going to be easy to remove.

Next door at KKMI there were five Bird Boats in various stages of restoration at the "Bird Nest." CURLEW, ORIOLE, and WIDGEON looked beautiful. I believe CURLEW is 91 years young, the second Bird Boat built

Down the way, the Volvo 70 MASERATI was hauled and parked next to a Folk Boat and SPIRIT. Interesting contrast in hull shapes.