Photo of the Day

October 14 - San Blas Islands

Today's Photo of the Day comes from the folks on Wild Rover, who more recently have spent time in Baltimore's extremely filthy - according to them - harbor.

The interspecies face off in the photo, however, took place in Panama's San Blas Islands. The character on the left is Bonney, one of Wild Rover's cats. The hard case on the right was an unknown species of crab "that sure was delicious."

The South Pacific Has Nothing
on Half Moon Bay

October 14 - Half Moon Bay

"A while back you guys published a photo saying that the greatest sunsets were to be seen in either the South Pacific or Mexico, I can't remember which," writes Manon Belzile of the Roberts 44 ketch Zubenubi. "But if you're in Half Moon Bay, you don't even need to untie the docklines - although it would be more fun - to see a great sunset. Here's one from last night at Pillar Point Harbor in Half Moon Bay. We've been having great sunsets here for a couple of months. Actually, we may have been having great sunsets all year long, but the fog blocks them 90% of the time."

The two best sunsets we've ever seen were from the Ala Wai Yacht Harbor in Honolulu just after that volcano blew off in the Philippines, and near Portofino, Italy. The key ingredient in both cases was lots of yellow to go along with the orange, purple, and blues. Too bad we didn't have our camera either time.

Two at the Top at the End of
Louis Vuitton Round Robin

October 14 - Auckland, NZ

Yesterday's racing ended the first round-robin of the Louis Vuitton Series to determine a challenger for the America's Cup. It's become quite clear that Seattle's OneWorld Challenge and the Swiss Alinghi Challenge - with 8-0 and 7-1 records - are in a class above the rest. Larry Ellison's Oracle BMW Challenge started strong with four straight victories, but they were over lesser teams. When they came up against the top teams, they lost three in a row before picking up a final victory over a Swedish boat that lost the use of their jibs.

Observers report that Oracle BMW has a narrow 'sweet spot' and is only very good in winds above 17 knots. Thanks to lesser sail area, which was traded off for increased draft, she's clearly slower downwind and off the pace in lighter winds. The big question is whether Oracle's other boat is better in a broader range of conditions or if she or US 76 can be modified to make her more competitive with the top two boats.

There's now a short break before the beginning of the second round-robin, which will determine the boat that's eliminated, which four boats go into the double elimination bracket, and which four boats go into the single elimination bracket. That OneWorld and Alinghi will proceed into the double eliminations are no brainers. Oracle probably has a better than average chance of being a third boat, with the fourth position being battled for by GBR Challenge, Team Dennis Conner, Prada, and Victory Challenge. Mascalzone Latino and Le Defi Areva will duel each other only for the right to avoid early elimination.

After the first round-robin, here are the standings:
8-0 OneWorld Challenge
7-1 Alinghi
5-3 Oracle BMW Racing
4-4 GBR Challenge
4-4 Team Dennis Conner
3-4 Prada
3-5 Victory Challenge
1-6 Mascalzone Latino
0-8 Le Defi Areva

Blue Angels . . . A Foggy Blur

October 14 - San Francisco

John Pettitt was on the Bay yesterday for the Blue Angels' performance and took a couple of photos. He reports that it was pretty crazy in that lots of folks didn't have an adequate length rode to keep a grip on the bottom, which sometimes caused boats to nearly collide.

In other cases, small boats were packed with people, none of whom were wearing PFDs. Be careful out there.

Around Alone Stays In Port

October 14 - Torbay, England

On account of the approach of gale force winds, the Around Alone fleet - which includes Northern Californian Bruce Schwab on Ocean Planet and former Southern Californian Brad Van Liew on Tommy Hilfiger - has postponed the start of the second leg. It's not that the boats can't take it, officials said, but they are hard to tow to the start in such conditions.

YOTREPS

October 14 - 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/

Weather Updates

October 14 - Pacific Ocean

San Francisco Bay Weather

To see what the winds are like on the Bay and just outside the Gate right now, check out http://sfports.wr.usgs.gov/wind/. The National Weather Service site for San Francisco Bay is at www.wrh.noaa.gov/Monterey/.

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/Maps/Southwest.shtml.

Pacific Winds and Pressure

The University of Hawaii Dept. of Meteorology page posts a daily map of the NE Pacific Ocean barometric pressure and winds.

Pacific Sea State

Check out the Pacific Ocean sea states at: http://www.mpc.ncep.noaa.gov/RSSA/PacRegSSA.html.
For views of sea states anywhere in the world, see http://www.oceanweather.com/data/.