Last month I had the opportunity to sail on southern California waters.
By Captain Ray
Published: August, 2010
As I was on the water, I couldn’t help comparing this bay with San Francisco Bay. Both are great harbors with completely protected water and both bays have southwest-facing entrances. San Diego Bay is shaped like a wide, curving river, in contrast to the more open, rounded shape of San Francisco Bay, and the sailing area is much more constrained.
Like San Francisco Bay, there are ship channels that provide access to the port for large ships. In San Francisco Bay the channels branch out and lead to areas as varied as Oakland, Redwood City and even Sacramento and Stockton. In San Diego Bay, one channel runs the entire length of the bay. While this makes it a little easier to know were those big ships are headed, it does concentrate more ships into a smaller area.
In addition, there is a significant U.S. Navy presence on San Diego Bay. Much of the shoreline of the main bay is dedicated to naval facilities for ships, submarines and aircraft. After making these these initial observations, I began to notice some very interesting vessels sharing this water with me. First, I watched a replica of the yacht America, the namesake of the America’s Cup, sailing on San Diego Bay.
This ship evokes a fascinating bit of sailing history. The U.S.-built schooner America originally was awarded the Cup when she won a prestigious yacht race in England in the year 1851. That victory began what was to become the longest winning streak in the history of organized sports: The New York Yacht Club successfully defended the Cup for 132 years! But in 1983, the Royal Perth Yacht Club, sailing Australia II, took the Cup down under. Four years later, the Cup came back to the United States when Stars & Stripes, sailing for the San Diego Yacht Club, brought it home. After that, America’s Cup was won by New Zealand and then Switzerland—yes, land-locked Switzerland! This past spring, Larry Ellison, sailing for the Golden Gate Yacht Club, won the Cup back from Switzerland. As the holder of the Cup, the Golden Gate Yacht Club will be defending it in a few years, possibly on San Francisco Bay.
At the same time the replica of America was out on the water, there were four modern America’s Cup boats sailing San Diego Bay. Built for past America’s Cup races, these boats are no longer competitive, and are now used as charter boats. Their masts towered over everything else on the water. The speed of these magnificent racing yachts—even in the comparatively light air of San Diego Bay—was amazing. If the Golden Gate Yacht Club chooses San Francisco Bay as the venue for its defense of America’s Cup (one can only hope), we will be able to see boats like these sailing the waters of San Francisco Bay very soon. Now that is something to look forward to!
Also sailing on San Diego Bay that day was the Californian, the state’s official tall ship. She is a replica of the Revenue Cutter Lawrence, which sailed California waters in the 1850s. The juxtaposition of two state-of-the-art sailing technologies, one from the 19th century and several from the 20th century, was a joy to watch.
Ray Wichmann, is a US SAILING-certified Ocean Passagemaking Instructor, a US SAILING Instructor Trainer, and a member of US SAILING’s National Faculty. He holds a 100-Ton Master’s License, was a charter skipper in Hawai’i for 15 years, and has sailed on both coasts of the United States, in Mexico, the Caribbean, and Greece. He is presently employed as the Master Instructor at OCSC Sailing in the Berkeley Marina.
