LUNCH AT THE ST FRANCIS YC, March 2006

[xroyal]

Bill, brings back some nice memories. A friend of mine is a member, and his dad, Jim Whilhite, once it's commodore. One rainy Sunday my friend and I went to SF boat show, and all the plastic got pretty boring. Peter suggested we might see his dad's old boat, Athene, a 63' S&S yawl built for R.J. Reynolds in the '30s. There she sat mint in the St Francis's 1st row of docks. Inspecting this woodie classic was a treat!

The good story is how his dad bought the boat. Peter's dad had wanted it, but was beaten out before he could bid. The new owner hurriedly sailed it out of SF bound north. About 11PM a night or so later Peter was out on a date, and spied the boat coming back thru the Gate, her sails in tatters. He rushed to Marin, awoke his dad who drove straight to SF, and bought the boat at the dock.

Amongst many stories about Athene, Peter was lucky, at about age 17, to be with his dad when the boat won a Transpac from L.A. to Tahiti. One of the crew was a dentist who pulled a bucket of bloody teeth from the grateful islanders. Peter is friends with the current owner, and I was very fortunate to sail on her 3 times, including a Master Mariners. Could be wrong, but I think she was about 60 tons...talk about plowing through vs bouncing over the water! Then too, how about 3 of us trying to drag that mamouth wet mainsail to the sail loft. Sad to think that the clubhouse burned years back, and a load of sailing history was lost.

You remind me I owe Peter a call. He was the first to introduce me to Bay sailing on his Santana 22. Having once been an olympic sailing hopeful along with the late Tom Blackhaller, he didn't know any way to sail but flat out. Later, he introduced me to Tom and others at the St Francis during the Big Boat series.

I've been living in Oregon 13+ years now, but warmly entertaining notions of selling my house, and living onboard in the Sausalito area.

Forgive the rambling. Thanks again for the great memories!

P.S. Peter cut those Bay marks so close think I could have kissed them all, including Southhampton Shoals. Gave me a few more grey hairs too.