YRA buoys are known for going on walkabout, so it wasn’t a surprise when the Blackaller buoy left its station last week. What was surprising was that one of the Bay’s most heavily used racing buoys was ultimately recovered! Matt Jones sent us the story. "The latest trip ended at Ocean Beach where it was spotted by local waterman Nick Mulford on Friday or Saturday," Jones said. "Knowing it belonged to the YRA, he rolled the buoy across the beach and muscled it into the bed of his pickup. Nick then dropped it off at the St. Francis YC hoist on Monday. Hopefully it will be back on station soon."

Mulford may not have known how important his recovery of the buoy was. Buoys are a big expenditure for YRA every year, and we’re told that the buoy budget for 2011 took some big hits and has already been spent. So with that in mind, and on behalf of all Bay Area sailors, we say, "Thanks, Nick!"

San Francisco Bay has long been known as a top spot to capture fantastic sailing photographs, attracting some of the most famous photographers in the world since George Eastman invented roll film. Two such photos are now competing for your vote in the World Yacht Racing Forum’s ‘Yacht Racing Image of the Year‘ contest. Now in its fourth year, the contest will honor the photographer whose photo gets the most online votes. Out of the 25 spectacular images in this year’s competition, two were taken on the Bay, and we’d encourage our readers to vote for their favorite — let’s see San Francisco represented at the Forum in Estoril, Portugal next month!

Now, we have our suspicions on who the two shutterbugs are but we’ll stay mum on the matter and instead show you the entries. We know which one we’re voting for — how about you? Click the link above to vote for your favorite — it’s easy and doesn’t require registering — and then pop on over to our Facebook page to tell us which one you voted for!