Fairly new to the fleet, Fred Von Stieff has been an engineer for Blue & Gold for the past two years.
Blue & Gold engineer Fred Von Stieff works on boats both professionally and personally. When not working, he can often be found on the water in one of his own boats that he fixes himself. Photo by Matt Larson
By Matt Larson
Published: May, 2014
Fairly new to the fleet, Fred Von Stieff has been an engineer for Blue & Gold for the past two years. A man of the water, he works on boats both professionally and personally. "I like coming to work," he says. "I love the people I work with. I would consider all of my coworkers actually friends."
Ferry passengers won’t see Von Stieff on the job because he and the engineers work behind the scenes. "I’m a nights guy," he said. "The boats run all day. When they come in at night is when a lot of the routine maintenance is done. The little things like oil changes, lights, all that kind of stuff."
The work is not all routine. "The deckhands grab us as soon as something happens," Von Stieff said. "That’s why our boats are in such good condition." Von Stieff helps keep the engine room clean, and credits the deckhands for keeping the boats so presentable all the time. "I mean, for public transportation? These things are completely pristine," he said. "And that’s the deckhands who are doing that."
Sometimes things do happen and a boat needs to be taken offline for maintenance. That’s when Vallejo, Von Stieff’s favorite boat, comes in to save the day. "It’s kind of like the little engine that could," he said. "It’s smaller than the other boats but it thinks it’s the biggest boat around." Von Stieff stresses that the big boats are always set to run first, "but as soon as a boat goes down, Vallejo is always ready to take over when it has to."
When he’s not working on the water, Von Stieff is often found sailing on it in either his Pearson 303 or Santana 23 D. He’s a member of the Vallejo Yacht Club and enjoys putting his engineering skills to use on his own vessel. "I bought my Pearson 303, not running, in Tiburon," said Von Stieff. "They towed us out and just let us go. My buddy was steering the boat while I was down at the bottom fixing it. I was able to fix the engine on the sail home; it was running and repaired by the time we had to start it and pull into the marina." It was a proud moment for Von Stieff, and a relief for his buddy. "We thought we were going to have to pull in under sail, which is always colorful," he explained. "You can’t really stop."
He hasn’t taken any epic sea journeys just yet, but Von Stieff looks forward to doing the Baja Ha-Ha, a sailing trip down to Mexico, someday. He plans to sail both there and back. "Believe it or not, some people stick their boat on a truck and it gets delivered home because they don’t want to run upwind for a thousand miles," he said. "That’s my favorite point of sail. It’s the most challenging, you can push the boat the hardest—I would definitely sail back."
Von Stieff especially loves his job for all he gets to learn. "It’s always something new," he said. "When you think you’ve seen it all you’ll find something that you never expected." And just like the ferry boats, Von Stieff keeps his sailboats in top condition. "My fabrication work has gotten a lot better after working here."
He also gets a lot of new ideas from his coworkers. "Whenever you get a group of guys together who work on boats for a living you’re going to learn a lot of different aspects of the job and different ways of looking at things. It’s been really rewarding and eye–opening to get so many different views on things," he said.
For the up-and-coming engineer, deckhand or captain, Von Stieff has some words of wisdom: "Stay open-minded," he said. "There are guys who’ve been doing this a lot longer than you—combined they’ve been doing it a hell of a lot longer. Basically, as ridiculous as some stuff sounds, they’re going to be right."
