August 13, 2001

Photo of the Day August 13 – Mouse Overboard! In what may have been a first, the crew of Profligate rescued a mouse/rat that had fallen overboard – and came to regret it. We were hoisting the main off the Spinnaker Restaurant in Sausalito, when a mouse/rat fell out of the mainsail and onto the cabin house. He couldn’t have been there long, because we’d been out sailing two days before. Anyway, he made a four foot leap off the cabin house, onto the deck, and into the drink. The sight of the little rodent fighting for survival in the cold waters of Richardson Bay tugged at the tender hearts of the Wanderer and Peter Costello, who, despite the shrieks of Dona de Mallorca, combined to scoop the little rodent out of the water. He was then placed in the solitary confinement of two plastic buckets on the cat’s ‘back porch’, and further confined by duct tape. Exactly what we hoped to do with the saved mouse/rat was unclear. Perhaps feed him to somebody’s pet snake. Alas, humanists make poor jailers. The little bugger miraculously escaped as he was last seen running about the back porch by Peter Costello. Although nobody saw it, we’ve convinced de Mallorca that the little guy jumped overboard again.

Photo Latitude/Richard

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Spectacular Sailing On The Bay August 13 – San Francisco Bay. For the second weekend in a row, there was spectacular sailing on San Francisco Bay. Check out some of the proof.

Photos Latitude/Richard

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What Happened To Team Adventure? August 13 – Atlantic Ocean Cam Lewis explains – in his shorthand – what happened to his 110-ft cat during their attempt at a TransAtlantic record: “We had near perfect conditions, we had established a nice lead of over 45 miles on the old record in the first 14 hours, and had sailed 367 miles in that time on pace for a 610 mile day, and settled into a comfortable and fast pace. 20 to 25 knots of wind, boat speed hovering around 28 knots, full main, staysail and quad gennaker hauling us down the track for a rendezvous near Newfoundland with a weather system as good as one could ask for. On paper – railroad tracks laid straight to the Lizard. A couple of more bumps to leeward, junk bouncing off our port daggerboard, hull and rudder to leeward. Crossing the Georges Bank, asking why is there so much junk in the ocean here and why are we smacking into it? Swirling currents, Gulf Stream eddies, Labrador currents and millions of people tossing their garbage into the sea close by. We had sailed around the world and hit nothing! “Then at daylight 0530 I had finally closed my eyes and was sleeping or at least dozing in a bunk just below the helmsman when a huge bang startled, adrenalin shooting through my neurons. I was on deck in a flash thinking that the pole had broken and expecting to see the mast tumbling down. It took a few seconds to zoom my eyes on to the leeward port bow which was definitely broken off and oscillating wildly in all directions. Broken off aft of the forward beam. Not what one would have expected from a collision with a ? We hit something. Stuart McKelvey was further aft in the windward cockpit and believes that what he saw closely resembled a section of an overturned white boat with a red waterline stripe about 15 feet long. No one else saw a thing. It was too foggy to even see the tip of the mast. Our speed barely slowed. The UFO (unidentified floating object) disappeared in the soup behind. Sails were dropped within minutes.

The impact caused the sacrificial crash box on the knuckle of the bow to shear off just as designed. The shock from the crash must have caused the massive failure of the hull/bow just aft of the forward crossbeam. A failure that will certainly have me, our crew and all the designers and engineers baffled. Right now we need a bus load of carbonologists and a truckload of money to get back out there and have another go at this elusive record. This is not the last of our team, we will be back.” Photo Courtesy www.teamadventure.org   The cat is now motoring toward Vinalhaven, Maine, having been towed ashore by the Canadian Coast Guard to have her props fitted.

Putting the Fun Back In Fundraising August 13 – San Francisco We did a little gig aboard Profligate last Saturday for 10 folks curious about big multihulls – and in the process raised $1,100 for Profligate and the Ha-Ha’s sister city, Caleras de Cofrado, in the mountains above San Blas, Mexico. Those aboard included Steve & Robin Dinger, who want a big cat for Europe; Mark and Ingard Berhardt, who want a big cat to sail around the world; Scott Myer, who is having an Ian Farrier 41-ft cat built in Australia; Glenn Fagerlin, who has a Kronos 45 cat on the Bay; Daniel Chollet and Elaine Dell-Santina, who are thinking about buying a cat in a couple of years; Robert Wilson who has a monohull; and our old friend Peter Costello. The afternoon was made all the more fun by the presence of David Crowe and his Morrelli and Melvin 70 cat Humu-Humu. We got some great shots of Humu-Humu – then the digits disappeared from the camera. So we’re waiting for backup photos. Meanwhile, we’ll leave you with this photo of Fagerlin’s Kronos 45. For he – like the Wanderer and de Mallorca – spent the whole next day sailing, too! Photo Latitude/Richard

In any event, thanks to everyone who came. The money – 100% of it – will go to help the very, very poor folks in that village in Mexico.     Photo Latitude/Annie We’d also like to thank Don and Madeline Swartz of Novato, who so far have enjoyed visits to Mexico by land rather than boat. Nonetheless, they forwarded $100 to be used for the indigenous village of Caleras de Cofrado and for the education in Braille of the young boy, Asuncion. Gracias!

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Great Sailing In Jolly Old England August 13 – Cowes, Isle of Wight Yesterday the 200+ boat Fastnet Race fleet headed off on that 608-mile race to Ireland and back. The headliners are maxis, Volvo 60s, and the 60-foot trimarans. Meanwhile, the three remaining J/Class yachts – Endeavour, Velsheda and Shamrock – are doing battle off of Cowes. Endeavour and Velsheda are currently tied, having won a race and taken a second.

Photo Courtesy/James Boyd www.madforsailing.com

YOTREPS August 13 – 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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Weather Updates August 13 – 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/. 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 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 another view, see http://www.oceanweather.com/data/global.html.