Here's LEGEND, winner 1957 Transpac, designed by Skip Caulkins and owned by the Ullman family. For her success, LEGEND was banned from the Transpac for 1959 and 1961 for being "out of the norm" for the CCA rule that favored wide, beamy boats like FINISTERRE. LEGEND was reinstated for the 1963 race, and the kid Dave Ullman raced on her that year when she won Class B.
LEGEND was built of strip planking in 1951 by Chappie in Costa Mesa, CA and when launched, was the first offshore boat with an aluminum rig in the U.S.
LEGEND met her demise on the return passage from the 1967 Transpac when her skipper and crew of scouts, navigating by DR in thick fog, mistook the red buoy marking Pt. Bennett on San Miguel Island for an identical red buoy 60 miles south marking Begg Rock. The CG admitted their error, but it was too late for LEGEND which drove ashore on wild and reefy Pt. Bennett.
LEGEND's shipwrecked delivery crew hiked 5 miles across desolate and windy San Miguel to Cuyler Harbor where they caught a ride to Santa Barbara on an urchin boat.
3 years later, on a Mexican delivery, Kim Desenberg and I hiked to Pt Bennett and accidentally found LEGEND's remains on the beach. There was the aluminum mast and boom half buried in the sand, pieces of hull, and the sails, including her blue and yellow spinnaker, which were being used as tents and blinds for scientists observing a newly discovered large population of elephant seals.
Here's a nostalgic pic of LEGEND in better times, anchored off Hanalei Pier in 1963, before beginning her delivery home to Newport Beach. Photo compliments of Captain Bob, who wins the Macapuno.
PS: one of the hints in the trivia was when I wrote: the boat in question, a legend in her time, was long and skinny...
PS2 can anyone identify the big, blue, 61 foot, Sparkman and Stephens sloop in LEGEND's background at Hanalei? She was a fixture on SF Bay, and her name became part of the first two speed winches.
Last edited by sleddog; 04-29-2023 at 11:19 AM.
Baruna was the sailboat.
Barient were the winches.
I am on a roll with incorrect guesses.
Ants
Not BARUNA. BARUNA (a yawl) was painted black. I remember hearing that they painted her silver underneath the black paint in an effort to reflect heat. The sloop in the photo is most likely ORIENT the Class A Transpac winner in 1963, and the other half of the Barient name.
Tom P.
There is still Macapuno left after DAZZLERs' and DURA MATERs' recent, back to back, forays to the CBC freezer. I know how you love answering coastal geography questions. Here's one everyone should know. First to answer wins the Macapuno. This photo is taken at a prominent California headland somewhere between Pt. St. George and Pt. Conception. To win, you must answer all three questions correctly in one guess. No limit on guesses.
1) What headland is this? 2) what is the prominent geographical feature in the foreground? 3) Why is it there?
Ready, set, go!
Last edited by sleddog; 05-03-2023 at 09:01 PM.
1. Bodega Head
2. Duck pond ( aka hole in head)
3. Excavated for a nuclear power station (PG&E)
Sam
1) Bodega head, east side, looking North East.
2)"Hole in the Head"
3)It's there because PIG&E (somehow I always ((mis))spell it this way) dug a hole for the foundation for a nuclear power plant in the late 50s-early 60s and was topped by the PUC in 1963. Fortunately after the Alaska quake in 1964 it was found that there was significant slippage at Bodega Head and that did it in for good.
Tom K
Sam narrowly wins the Macapuno by 4 minutes over Tom.. The photo shows "Hole in the Head" on Bodega Head, a 70 foot deep excavation for a nuclear power plant begun by PG&E in the early 60's until local and Sonoma County opposition put a stop to the folly, being built directly on the San Andreas earthquake fault. Local rancher Rose Gaffney led the opposition. The 8.5 magnitude Anchorage quake in 1964 finally put to rest any further building efforts by PG&E when geologists found the quake had caused significant slippage at Bodega Head.
During this time, a nuclear power plant was proposed for Davenport, 8 miles upwind from Santa Cruz and Monterey Bay. Yikes!
Last edited by sleddog; 05-04-2023 at 06:48 AM.
Ok I see a 70 foot deep hole filled with water. I am curious to know if that is fresh water, or salt water?
fresh water allows masketos to flourish, unless it is stocked with frogs.