Chuck Hawley Recalls an Ugly Delivery on ‘Zamazaan’

We all learn from experience, and I just thought of an incident that occurred about 45 years ago when I was lucky enough to sail on Zamazaan regularly. Here is my story:

Around 1979, I crewed on Zamazaan, which was a 52-ft Bruce Farr sloop built out of kauri wood. It was a blast to sail, with small cockpits scattered on the deck so that the mainsheet trimmer (me) had his own little cubbyhole from which to trim. If you needed to go somewhere inside the boat, you were constantly at risk of bonking your head, since the only places with decent headroom were the saloon and galley.  Farr, in an attempt to keep the center of gravity low, had tucked multiple fuel tanks under the sole, each of which held very little fuel, so you were always changing tanks if you powered for any distance. After an Año Nuevo Race, I delivered Zamazaan from Monterey to San Francisco under power, at night, upwind, with three other crew. The engine was placed in the forepeak so that the weight distribution would put the boat in bow-down trim, as was the trend in the days of the IOR Rule. I think the engine was a Perkins 4-236, which seems big, but, hey, there was a credit for having a big engine. And the boat powered like a steam locomotive.

We ran out of fuel about 8 miles from the Golden Gate. We had no wind, big swells, and no electric fuel pump. So, for about 30 minutes, I sat next to the Perkins, flipping the little priming lever on the engine’s fuel pump, in a forepeak that must have been 120 degrees. Big engine, small forepeak. Eventually, I was able to suck fuel to the forepeak from somewhere around the galley, where a full tank was located, probably 20 feet aft. It was sweaty, bouncy, and reeked of diesel. It’s a wonder I didn’t get violently sick.

After that, I appreciated electric fuel pumps (even if only used for priming), short fuel-hose runs, larger, taller tanks, and better engine access. But I remember Zamazaan as being one of the best boats to race around the buoys. Great Fun was our nemesis at the time.

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