The online home of Spaulding Wooden Boat Center members, volunteers & friends

Saving the Bay is four one-hour episodes tracing San Francisco Bay from its geologic origins following the last Ice Age 10,000 years ago through years of catastrophic exploitation to the restoration efforts of today. It’s on local public TV broadcasting with many repeat showings.

Home page:  http://www.savingthebay.org
Broadcast schedule:  KQED/KTEH schedule

November 4, 2009 will be the 240th anniversary of the Spanish discovery of San Francisco Bay by a land expedition of Juan Gaspar de Portolà in 1769.

Artist’s conception of the Portolà expedition’s first sighting of San Francisco Bay from Sweeney Ridge in 1769

From Wikipedia.org:

The first recorded European discovery of San Francisco Bay was on November 4, 1769 when Spanish explorer Gaspar de Portolà, unable to find the port of Monterey, California, continued north close to what is now Pacifica and reached the summit of the 1,200-foot (370 m) high Sweeney Ridge, where he sighted San Francisco Bay. Portolà and his party did not realize what they had discovered, thinking they had arrived at a large arm of what is now called Drakes Bay. At the time, Drakes Bay went by the name Bahia de San Francisco and thus both bodies of water became associated with the name. Eventually, the larger, more important body of water fully appropriated the name San Francisco Bay.  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Francisco_Bay

National Park Service flyer on San Francisco Bay Discovery site (PDF)

Students put finishing touches today on the second Norwegian pram built by the Youth Boatbuilding and Sailing program at the Spaulding Wooden Boat Center. More photos are available on the Youth Boatbuilding Blog.

A special event to launch the new pram will take place in early November at the Spaulding Wooden Boat Center. Contact Program Director Andrea Rey for details.

Mavis, a San Francisco Bird Boat, was built in 1924 by Bagley Nunes.

The photo below was taken this morning in the boatyard at the Spaulding Wooden Boat Center.

Mavis in the Spaulding boatyard 9-14-09

The photo below of Mavis with the Lightship San Francisco was taken 71 years ago, in 1938, just outside the Golden Gate, not long after the Golden Gate Bridge opened (1937).

Lightship San Francisco 1938 by born1945, on Flickr

You can find more information about these classic San Francisco Bay boats at www.birdboat.com.

August 29, 2009

See a photo gallery from the race on our photo blog, at woodenboat.posterous.com

Here’s your opportunity to sail on a classic gaff schooner, Gas Light, in an exciting race, the Great San Francisco Schooner Race, Saturday, August 29, on San Francisco Bay.

The Golden Gate Tall Ships Society has made a great offer especially for members of the Spaulding Wooden Boat Center.

The day starts with boarding Gas Light at Schoonmaker Point Marina in Sausalito at 10am. The boat sails promptly at 10:30am to join the 11:00 parade of schooners down Raccoon Strait followed by a pursuit race at noon starting off the Knox buoy. Following the completion of the race, there will be a post-race no-host barbecue with live music on the clubhouse deck of the San Francisco Yacht Club in Belvedere. The beer is free but there is a $20 charge (payable in cash) for the barbecue.

Participants on Gas Light who do not want to stay for the barbeque will need to arrange their own transportation back to Sausalito from Belvedere as Gas Light will be staying through the party before returning to Schoonmaker Cove Marina at approximately 8pm. It’s a full day of some of the most spectacular sailing boats that you will ever see in one place and at one time on San Francisco Bay.

Cost to Spaulding Wooden Boat Center members for the sail is $75, which includes a light lunch and beverages.

Summary
Saturday, August 29
10:00 am – Boarding at Schoonmaker Point Marina in Sausalito
10:30 am – Depart Schoonmaker Marina
8:00 pm – Return to Schoonmaker Marina on Gas Light from Belvedere after the reception (or earlier with your own transportation from SFYC in Belvedere)

To secure your place, please make a payment via PayPal using the link below, or contact Alice Cochran at 415 457-8997 by phone to arrange to pay by check.

Use the following link and select the $75 guest ticket for the Great San Francisco Schooner Race. Buy tickets

Update, August 30: See a photo gallery from the race on our photo blog, at woodenboat.posterous.com

More information:

Gas Light is a 72 foot gaff rigged scow schooner built in 1991, and a replica of the famous San Francisco hay scows that plied the bay during the nineteenth century until the advent of the internal combustion engine.

For a more in-depth history of San Francisco scow schooners, see the following source:

http://www.nps.gov/history/maritime/nhl/alma.htm

View larger player at SFGate Web site

Musicians from the Sausalito boatbuilding and maritime community gather on Thursday nights to make music and enjoy each other’s company.

Source:  Sausalito waterfront pickers and singers, from San Francisco Chronicle and SFGate, Tuesday, August 18, 2009.

Anyone who loves both wooden boats and photography knows that it’s hard to take a bad photo of a wooden boat. We embrace that belief and post many photos of wooden boats of all types that are in our boatyard, on San Francisco Bay and elsewhere.

We post photos on these sites on the Web:

♦  Our main Web site’s Media Gallery, with photo galleries, slide shows and videos, at Spaulding Center Web Media Gallery.

♦  Photos from our Twitter posts can be found on both TwitPic and Posterous.

♦  We have an active photo pool on Flickr, the photo sharing site, of wooden boats on San Francisco Bay, at Wooden Boats on San Francisco Bay. We currently have over 200 photos in the pool and welcome your photo contributions.

♦  Finally, we post photos on our blogs at Brightwork (where we are now) and the Youth Boatbuilding & Sailing Blog.

Here’s a screen capture of our Posterous photo gallery at woodenboat.posterous.com:

Galilee Harbor, a community of house boats and boat houses, held its annual Maritime Day festival yesterday in Sausalito. The Spaulding Wooden Boat Center was on hand to offer rides on our 1906 gaff sloop Polaris. Skipper Martín and his crew Dylan and Jody took 21 guests out sailing during the day.

Most residents of Galilee Harbor are artists drawn by the cooperative nature of the community, and the marina was organized with the goal of preserving a working floating home community matched with land-based marine services.

On Friday the Spaulding Center held its annual volunteer appreciation picnic and barbecue at Ayala Cove on Angel Island in San Francisco Bay.  A flotilla of three sailboats—SWBC’s own Polaris and Pegasus wooden sloops and my 36′ sloop—ferried revelers from the Spaulding Wooden Boat Center in Sausalito to Ayala Cove and back to Sausalito at the end of the day.

The weather was perfect. A couple of us had spent the night before the picnic on my sailboat moored in the cove and it was foggy and cold the day and evening before the picnic. Fortuntately Friday dawned with less fog and it cleared up quickly, just in time for our party on the island.

The State Park’s Live Web cam of Ayala Cove

The Spaulding Boatworks spar loft has been busy for many weeks refinishing the spars from the beautiful 1938 Philip Rhodes 48′ yawl, Copperhead. The main mast received eighteen coats of varnish and the mizzen and boom each got fifteen coats. On Tuesday, those spars were returned to Copperhead.

Freda, our 1885 gaff sloop, began the next stage in her restoration today at the Spaulding Center. Framing has been completed and planking her hull has commenced.

View forward

View from the bow

Apprentice Matt Pool lays out one of Freda's sheer planks

Matt Pool, in photo above, is an apprentice at the Arques School of Traditional Boatbuilding, located at the Spaulding Wooden Boat Center in Sausalito. Matt will become a journeyman when he graduates next month from the Arques School’s professional boatbuilding program.

The wood for Freda‘s new planks was donated by the Master Mariners Benevolent Association. Read more about Freda on our Web site at Freda.

Famous sailors, authors and world cruisers Lin and Larry Pardey dropped into the Spaulding Center today to touch base on the progress of Freda and to update the foundry patterns currently under the care of SWBC (see Pardey Foundry Patterns for Taleisin on our Web site). The Pardeys’ Lyle Hess cutter, Taleisin of Victoria (currently in Tonga), was hauled out at the Spaulding Center last year.

Arques School Director Robert Darr, Larry, Lin and SWBC Program Director Andrea Rey at the Spaulding Center

You can read more about the Pardeys at their Web site, Sailing with Lin and Larry Pardey.

Annual Spaulding Wooden Boat Center Volunteer Appreciation Party

Friday, July 31 2009, 10am – 4pm

Spaulding Wooden Boat Center volunteers are invited to our Annual Volunteer Sail BBQ & Picnic at Ayala Cove on Angel Island. Cruising over to Angel Island is a wonderful way to spend the day and a great opportunity to catch up with old friends and meet new people.

SWBC will provide food, drinks and boat transportation to and from Angel Island.

Our 1906 gaff sloop Polaris arriving at Angel Island for 2008 picnic

Please RSVP to Andrea at the Spaulding Center via e-mail or phone.

Students and volunteers in the Spaulding Wooden Boat Center Youth Boatbuilding and Sailing Program took their Norwegian pram Guppy for a sail through downtown Sausalito yesterday in the 4th of July parade. The young boatbuilders left hundreds of candies and bubbles in their wake.

Thanks to David MacLaird of MacLaird Construction for the use of his truck and for driving us in the parade.