August 10, 2000

Story of the Day Solo Sister August 10 – Sausalito For most of us, sailing singlehanded out to the Farallones and back is a pretty big challenge, let alone doing the 2,200-mile Singlehanded TransPac to Hawaii. But German cruiser Christine Popadentschuk made those feats seem like a walk in the park when she arrived at San Francisco Bay after 113 days at sea. The tall, red-headed singlehander had set sail March 10 from the Strait of Magellan in southern Patagonia – a journey of 7,000 miles. See the September ‘Latitude 38’ for the complete story. Christine didn’t have proper charts for Patagonia. She points out her route on a conventional wall map. Photo Latitude/Andy

Weather Updates August 10 – Pacific Ocean San Francisco Bay Weather To see what the winds are like on the Bay right now, check out http://sfports.wr.usgs.gov/wind/. California Coast Weather Looking for current as well as recent wind and sea readings from 17 buoys and stations between Pt. Arena and the Mexican border? Here’s the place – which has further links to weather buoys and stations all over the U.S. www.ndbc.noaa.gov/stuff/southwest/swstmap.shtml Pacific Ocean Weather Check out the weather map at right.

University of Hawaii Meteorology Graphic Click here to see enlarged graphic.

Pacific Sea State

Seas are relatively normal in the North Pacific.
Have a look at http://www.mpc.ncep.noaa.gov/RSSA/PacRegSSA.html.

For another view, see http://www.oceanweather.com/data/global.html.

Tropical Disturbances

Hurricane Alberto, the first Atlantic hurricane of the season,
is now back up to 65 knots, which is bad news, but the good news
is that he appears to be headed far to the north and away from
the Caribbean and East Coast of the U.S. Depression Four, just
150 miles off the coast of Florida, bears watching, although it’s
poorly defined and only has 35 knot winds.

Over in the Eastern Pacific, former Hurricane Gilma, now well
off the coast of Mexico, is down to 30 knots as it moves even
further out to sea.

See http://weather.unisys.com/hurricane/atlantic/2000/index.html
and http://weather.unisys.com/hurricane/e_pacific/2000/index.html
for more.

Tropical Depression Four (left) and Hurricane Alberto

Hurricane Gilma off Mexico

Unisys Weather Graphics

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Cruising

Splash and Click!

August 10 – New Zealand.

Steve and Dorothy Darden, formerly of Tiburon and now residents
of New Zealand, report that their new Morelli & Melvin 52
cat ‘Adagio’ is back in the water and they’re getting ready to
cruise. For many fine pictures and other details of the boat,
visit http://homepage.mac.com/adagio/.

The ‘Adagio’ Family

Sailing at last! Photos Courtesy ‘Adagio’

YOTREPS

August 10 – The Pacific Ocean and Cyberspace

Who is out making passages in the Pacific and what kind of
weather are they having? Check out YOTREPS – ‘yacht reports’ –
at http://www.bitwrangler.com/yotreps/

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Racing

Santa Barbara to King Harbor Race

August 10 – SoCal

What could the race officials have been thinking? During last
weekend’s 81-mile Santa Barbara to King Harbor Race, Al Schultz’s
ULDB 70 ‘Vicki’ – while carrying a chute in 28 to 30 knots of
wind and obviously traveling very fast – came across a flipped
36-foot catamaran with the crew hanging onto a crossbeam. The
crew of ‘Vicki’ did the right thing: they dropped their chute
and motored back upwind to render assistance. The cat crew clearly
indicated that they would rather get aboard ‘Vicki’ than wait
for the Coast Guard, and the main was dropped on the sled so the
rescue could be made.

Obviously this took a lot of time, so after finishing, ‘Vicki’
– which for obvious reasons came in last of the six Class A boats
– requested redress for the time lost rescuing the distressed
mariners. Such requests are common and proper. What is seemingly
improper and unusual is that the race committee refused their
request! We’re going to look into this.

Kenwood Cup

August 10 – Hawaii

Meanwhile, over in Hawaii the final results of the 29-boat
Kenwood Cup were held in limbo until the race committee decided
how much time to give the Farr 45 ‘Big Apple III’ and the Beneteau
40.7 ‘Smile’ in redress for standing by Scooter Simmons’ Belvedere-based
Sydney 41 ‘Cha-Ching’ after she lost part of her mast in high
winds off Molokai. As was proper, both boats were given time.
‘Big Apple III’ for New Zealand got 2 hours and 38 minutes while
the Aussie boat ‘Smile’ – top overall performer in the series
– got 1 hour and 45 minutes, lifting her from 17th to second in
the final race. Nonetheless, the Kiwi Team’s success in the final
race was enough for them to overtake the Aussies and win the Kenwood
Cup for a second year in a row. For further details and great
photos, see www.kenwoodcup.com.

Quebec to St. Malo Race

August 10 – St. Malo, France

Yesterday we reported that with just one hour to go, seven
of the 60-foot trimarans were bunched around the St. Malo finish
with only a few miles separating them in the most tightly contested
transatlantic race ever. We can now report that the order of finish
was ‘Groupama’, ‘Biscuits La Trinitaine’, and ‘Bayer en France’.
Remarkably, we can’t tell you how close the finish was, because
it hasn’t been reported on the race site. We do know that all
of the trimarans averaged over 12 knots for the more than 3,000-mile
course. Yvan Bourgnon had the best 24 hours of all, covering an
astounding 625 miles, missing the giant cat ‘Club Med’s record
by just half a mile. For details, visit http://www.transat2000.com/