Eric Moe, who day sails a 20-ft cat off
the beach at Pt. Richmond, forwarded today’s Photos of the Day.
They were taken by Leon Telvig, Moe’s father-in-law, in Skagen,
which is in northern Denmark. Moe wondered if they might be shots
of Jim Clark’s gigantic new yacht Athena. We assured him
they weren’t, as Clark’s new 292-footer is a modern version of
a clipper ship, and won’t be done until next year. We’re almost
certain the photos are of the new Ranger, the original
of which is reputed to be the fastest J Class yacht ever.
The 135-ft Ranger was designed by
W. Starling Burgess and Olin Stephens, built by Bath Iron Works
in Maine in 1937, and owned by Harold Vanderbilt. On the way
to the America’s Cup that year, her 165-ft duraluminum mast fell
overboard in a quartering sea. She used a borrowed mast to win
the right to defend the America’s Cup, then beat T.O.M. Sopwith’s Endeavour II 5-0, setting five course records in as many
races. After a brilliant career of winning 32 of 34 races, she
was broken up for scrap during World War II.
While in Guadaloupe earlier this year,
we ran into a fellow who used to crew on Windward Passage
in the ’70s, who said he was the project manager of Ranger.
He told us the new yacht was being built in conformity with the
J Class rules for an Atlanta developer who owns or has owned
the maxi cruising boats Georgia and Atalanta –
both of which bear a striking resemblance to wedding cakes. So Ranger is a big change in style. The fellow told us that
the new Ranger would certainly be ready for the classic
yacht regattas in the Med in October of this year. If so, they’d
better hurry from Denmark to St. Tropez. Presumably she’ll be
in the Caribbean this winter, hopefully to play with the other
J Class yachts Endeavour, Shamrock, and Velsheda
at events such as the Antigua Classic Regatta.
Photos Leon Telvig
Management Problems at Government-Run
Marinas
September 3 – Oakland/Long Beach
“I tried to make a reservation for
a slip at Jack London Square in late August, and a woman told
me that a lot of the staff had been laid off so they weren’t
letting boats use the empty slips because they didn’t have the
staff to administrate them,” writes Sean Spratt of the Pete’s
Harbor-based Hans Christian 33 Leucothea. “I am assuming
that this facility was paid for by taxpayers, and I am outraged
that we can’t use it. I called the Mayor’s office, and they referred
me to the Port of Oakland, and they said to call them back if
I did not get any cooperation. I did leave a few messages, I
did get a call back message, but they were out of the office
today.”
Unfortunately, we’ve had similar problems
with other government-owned marinas. For example, just last weekend
we called Alamitos Bay Marina in Long Beach from Profligate
at Catalina to see if they had any end-ties available. During
the first call, the woman said, “Oh yeah, come on over,
we’ve got plenty of them open.” When we called back 10 minutes
later to leave a credit card number, another woman said, “That
person didn’t know what she was talking about, we don’t have
any end-ties.” Then that version was amended to the marina
having had one end-tie cancellation and another presumably open
because the boat there hadn’t met the noon payment deadline.
For some reason, the person in the harbormaster’s office couldn’t
look to see if the spaces were open, and suggested we take a
look ourselves. We did, although doing so required our going
an hour out of our way. Both of the end-ties that should have
been empty, and in any event hadn’t been paid for, were, in fact,
occupied. The folks at Alamitos Bay are very nice, and we’ve
often enjoyed their hospitality, but can’t they keep better track
of their slips than that?
It wasn’t the first time either. A year
ago, they assigned us to an end-tie for a week. After putting
our boat in it, we flew back north. They called early the next
morning to insist we move the boat – immediately – to another
berth. We, the customer, bailed them, the management, out of
their problem by imposing on a friend in Newport to drive up
to Long Beach and move the boat for us. We don’t want to be overly
critical, but we can’t understand the problem in administering
such a small number of transient slips. It’s these kinds of experiences
that make large segments of the public think the government is
ill-equipped to manage businesses and should turn them over to
private enterprise.
All’s reasonably well that ends well, we
suppose, and we ended up at the tall ship Californian’s
slip at Rainbow Marina, another Long Beach-operated marina but
in the downtown area.
“Say, that don’t look like a tall ship
to me!”
Photo Latitude/Richard
Soak It and It Will Grow
September 3 – Cowes, UK
Photo Latitude/Richard
Now we’ve seen everything! The accompanying
picture is of an XL Brookes & Gatehouse T-shirt we were given
at the Swan European Regatta last July. As you can see, it is
vacuum-packed – or some such process – into a cube about the
size of two cigarette packs. The instructions say to soak the
shirt in water and it will grow to its full size. We’re told
the new packaging debuted at last year’s Antigua Sailing Week,
where the shirts were used for the infamous wet T-shirt contest…
The only problem with the shirt is that we’re so enamored with
the way it’s packaged, we’re reluctant to open it!
YOTREPS
September 3 – The Pacific Ocean and Cyberspace
Who is out making passages in the Pacific
and what kind of weather are they having? The YOTREPS daily yacht
tracking page has moved to www.bitwrangler.com/psn.
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.
