Posts from — April 2009

We here at OCSC have been following the story of Zac Sunderland, a 16 year old Californian attempting to be the youngest person to circumnavigate the world single-handed.  He is currently approaching Grenada, one of the last few stops of his journey.  He has a remarkable story:

From the first day Zac Sunderland said hello to planet earth, it seems he was destined to live the sailor’s life. Brought home from the hospital to his first home, a 55′ Tradewind in Marina del Rey, California, he was assigned his first bunk and listened to his mom tell the world of his birth over a single side-band radio…he never looked back… [Read more →]

Shirley Doell, OCSC Instructor, stands behind her Bay chart project at OCSC

You may have noticed the incredible  new collection of  charts  that have been posted in the stairwell to the clubroom at OCSC.  The charts offer a detailed view of the Bay on a large scale.  The useful tool is constructed from 5 charts fit together to provide a clear picture of the entire South Bay, Central Bay and  San Pablo Bay. The charts also extend through the Carquinez Straight through Suisun Bay and along the Pacific coast up to Drakes Bay,  It’s a great resource for members and guests to get a sense of the extensive  nature of the entire Bay. A special thanks to Shirley Doell, OCSC Instructor, for spearheading the project!

I did this project on my wall at home when I was 13 years old.  Thats where I got the idea. It was fun to do then , and even more fun now! -Shirley Doell

The Castaway Dog

Apparently Tom Hanks and Robinson Crusoe aren’t the only ones who can survive on a deserted island.  A cattle dog,  Sophie Tucker, was recently rescued after 4 months of being deserted on an island off the coast of Australia.

When Jan Griffith’s much-loved dog, Sophie Tucker, was washed overboard in stormy seas as the family were cruising on their yacht off Mackay on the east coast of Australia, she believed that her pet had drowned.

Despite a frantic search there was no sign of the animal and Mrs Griffiths and her husband, Dave, resigned themselves to never seeing their dog again. Their children bought their parents a new pet — a red cattle dog named Ruby — and life slowly got back to normal.

Unknown to her owners, Sophie Tucker, a black and tan cattle dog, was not a quitter. It seems that the determined pet swam five nautical miles through seas inhabited by sharks to an island, where she survived for more than four months by eating wild goats.

Read More of the Sail World Article…

The 'Electric Leopard' is the newest addition to the OCSC Fleet.

We’re proud to announce the ‘Electric Leopard’ as the newest addition to the OCSC Fleet! The ‘Electric Leopard’ (’eLeopard’ for short) uses an environmentally friendly diesel-electric propulsion system.  The 43′ Catamaran was built in Cape Town, South Africa in 2005.  After it was launched, it made the 8,000 mile trip from Cape Town to Tortola, BVI, where it spent two years in The Moorings’ charter fleet. Since 2007, eLeopard has logged 7,700 miles, most recently from the British Virgin Islands via the Panama Canal to Emeryville, CA.

‘Electric Leopard’ will now be available for private skippered charter.  This will offer sailors the opportunity to enjoy the speed and luxury of premier catamaran sailing while experiencing the latest in green boating technology.

“We are proud to have ‘Electric Leopard’ join our fleet,” stated Anthony Sandberg, President of OCSC Sailing.  “We felt an electric catamaran was a perfect match with our endeavors to operate as green and energy-conscious as possible.” We will be offering an advanced course based on the eLeopard to teach people how to sail the larger catamarans they will likely encounter when booking charter vacations worldwide.  We’ll have more information on this course very soon. The eLeopard will also be available for Private Lessons.
Be sure to visit us and the ElectricLeopard at the Strictly Sail Boat Show in Oakland April 15-18.  We’re located in the new “Green Boating Zone.”

Read more about the Electric Leopard in BYM News.

Gar and Nicole scuba diving in Palau, Micronesia ©Nicole Duke

Thanks so much to Gar and Nicole for taking the time for this interview with us.  If you missed the previous posts, be sure to check out Part 1 and Part 2.  Now back to our  cruising couple…

What has been your favorite experience since you’ve been out there?

[Gar]: Honestly, this is a tough one to try to pinpoint experiences, but three “places” have really stood out so far.  The first is the Tuamotu Islands of French Polynesia.  We had two of our best friends on for a month sailing around these beautiful atolls, snorkeling the passes, and just enjoying the peace and beauty of this part of the world.  When you get the opportunity to share such a magical place like this with best friends, it doesn’t get much better. [Read more →]

OCSC Sailing CEO Rich Jepsen is an avid J24 racer, holding the position of ‘driver’ on the J24, Rail to Rail, owned by Thom Henneberger, an OCSC alumnus. Together, Rich and Thom have been sailing together for 13 years, always with a crew of OCSC alumni.  They’ve always been near the top of the fleet, winning the season championship in 2003.   In fact, Rail to Rail has been a development platform for skilled OCSC members to learn one-design racing.  Larry Ledgerwood learned to sail from OCSC over two decades ago, qualifying to be an OCSC sailing instructor in 2000;  Trena Depel has been an OCSC member for 11 years and Carol Click, 7 years. Following are reports from their 2009 regattas, from Rich’s perspective. [Read more →]

OCSC has always and will always be committed to the conservation and protection of our natural environment, especially the San Francisco Bay. We’re proud to support our friends who have created Saving the Bay.

Saving the Bay, narrated by Robert Redford, is a lively and timely public television series about one of America’s greatest natural resources — San Francisco Bay. Being shot in HDTV for national broadcast, Saving the Bay consists of four one-hour episodes focusing on the geological, cultural, and developmental history of San Francisco Bay and the larger northern California watershed from the Sierra Nevada mountains to the Farallon Islands in the Pacific Ocean.

Conceived as more than purely a television series, Saving the Bay is a huge public education project designed to raise awareness about San Francisco Bay — its evolution, how we almost lost and then saved the Bay, and how we are planning the future of the Bay including wetland restoration, increased public access and balancing the often competing needs of a fragile ecosystem which is the centerpiece of a major urban area with over 7 million people.

Embark on the California Hornblower on April 20, 2009 at 6:00 p.m. Pier 3, San Francisco, returning at 7:30 pm

Please join Saving the Bay on this evening cruise and special preview of the series and meet some of the people who appear on camera as well as the team behind the scenes.  Submit donations and ticket requests by debit, credit card, or check directly at the Saving the Bay Donation Page. Checks should be made out to KQED, noting Saving the Bay, and sent to: Ron Blatman, c/o ESA, 225 Bush Street, Suite 1700, San Francisco, CA 94104.

For more information please contact Kele Palmer at kpalmer@esassoc.com or (415) 896-5900 ext.369.

Nicole with a Stingray- French Polynesia ©Nicole Duke

We hope you enjoy reading this amazing story as much as we do here at OCSC… If you missed Part 1 of this interview please find it here. You can look forward to Part 3 next Tuesday!

[OCSC]: Can you describe the feelings you felt the day you went out the Gate and turned left?

[Gar]: It’s still as clear for me as the day we left. I was a total wreck emotionally and psychologically exhausted from all the work getting ready to actually leave for good. We had been working non-stop for months when we sold our houseboat we lived on, sold our cars, and pretty much everything we owned. On top of that I was working on the boat constantly installing gear and getting our boat ready for the big journey. We had high expectations of doing some smaller trips to prepare for the big event, but never felt like we had the luxury of time to do it if we really wanted to leave before winter storms blew in. So we never did any smaller overnight trips and we had lots new gear we still hadn’t used much like our radar, windvane, etc

When we actually sailed out the Gate a couple of days after Thanksgiving in 2006 it was a powerful experience. It was a gorgeous crisp sunny Autumn day and a school of dolphins escorted us out into the Pacific. Nicole’s folks were on the bridge waving a flag to us and Nicole was waving one back from our bowsprit. We were on a beautiful beam reach and everything was perfect. It finally hit me that we were actually on our way and I was so exhausted, so excited, and so nervous all at once, that I just broke down and cried for a long time.

[Nicole]: It feels like a lifetime ago. I remember being excited scared and open to everything. Mostly I was scared and my stomach was somewhere up in my throat. The universe reconfirmed my capabilities when the darkness of a new moon night descended upon us, and Gar was really seasick. I knew in that instant when I took my watches and when I lay awake listening to him wretch and then the clinking of his tether that I had everything under control for myself and I could do it. My fear evaporated on my 4 am watch and was replaced with peace as I sat in darkness and listened to the ocean against the hull. [Read more →]