Home	Petaluma Memorial Day Cruise 5/27-30/22

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Petaluma Yacht Club always throws a great Memorial Day Party. In a reprise of its successful past, the Pirate theme, with plenty of Johnny Depp sightings, returned. Though Commodore Egan touted the glories of the event, and scoured the bilges for attendees, we headed into the weekend with just the Commodore's Kapai, Cruise Chair Matt Callahan's Gypsy and Kerry Scott's Cali planning to arrive by boat, plus Vanishing Animal arriving by Land Yacht. Unfortunately Matt was rear-ended in a serious crash on the 21st, and though his two children were basically unhurt, he is banged up (but nothing broken) and had to drop out.

PYC's instructions requested that each arriving yacht club group schedule their own opening for the D Street Bridge, the entrance to the basin at the yacht club. There is a six foot deep 6 mile dredged channel in western San Pablo Bay from the 7' countour to the mouth of the Petaluma River. It's another 11.7 miles to the turning basin at the Yacht Club - and the D Street Bridge. Thus to request a bridge opening at a certain time you have to calculate backwards from that time to when you leave your home port. On Friday the 27th, there was a flood tide in the morning, which is an opposing current for boats needing to go north under the Bay Bridge, but it becomes a following current once you get north of about Alcratraz and arrive off Angel Island. And, with luck, there is at least a small current you can ride up the Petaluma River to the basin. Matt had planned to go up on Thursday, but Kapai and Cali were aiming for a Friday arrival.

Rick Van Mell offered a trip planning worksheet, originally developed for arriving at the great Canadian passes at slack water for a Desolation Sound cruise. The spreadsheet starts with a planned boat speed through the water and the length of each leg along the way. Then you can enter the current expected along each leg, the "transit current" that will slow you down or speed you up to calculate the expected Speed Over Ground (SOG). Then you can play with the starting time to get an arrival time that matchs the slack water, or in this case, the desired bridge opening time. The legs for Kapai were from her home port of South Beach Harbor to the current change off Angel Island. Then the leg to Pt. San Pablo, then to the start of the 6 mile channel at mark G1, next at the entrace to the river, and finally the 11.7 miles to the basin. Commodore Egan wanted a mid-afternoon arrival, and selected a 15:15 target, then allowed for error by planning to leave port at 0845. That would be an arrival at 1436, with plenty of time to spare. Here's the link to Trip Plan Petaluma.

And here's a link to the article that Matte Gray wrote about the Bridges of the Petaluma River. Great pictures of the bridges the fleet passed on their way to PYC, including the old railroad bridge, the Rt 37 Bridge, Highway 101, and the D Street Bridge.

Since the request was for groups of boats to arrive together, Commodore Egan (Kapai) arranged with Kerry (Cali) to rendezvous at the G1 buoy at (as shown in the Trip Plan) 11:25. Your Webmaster (Rick VM) wanted pictures of both of them and agreed to drive up to the Black Point Launch Ramp at the Rt 37 Bridge at the entrance to the Petaluma River to take pics as they went by, so he targeted arriving there before 12:28 (from the Plan.) Well here's how it all played out. Kapai departed South Beach at bit after 0900 (later than Plan), but had favorable wind and at times hit 8 knots. As agreed, Rick E (Egan) called Rick VM at 1030, as Rick VM was wrapping up a client meeting, and told him of his progress and that he was past the Richmond Bridge and essentially back on the timeline. Rick VM departed his meeting, returned home to pick up Sandy, and had the Land Yacht doing 60 knots for the 1 hour and 23 minute run to Black Point Launch Ramp with a target arrival (per cellphone map) of 12:24. Long story short, Rick VM pulled into the Launch Ramp at 12:23, leaving the engine running, he grabbed his camera and quickly walked out to the dock. Great - it looked like an Islander just passing the old railroad bridge. But wait, there was another just past the Rt 37 bridge. With telephoto lens, Rick VM captured Kapai as she was about 100 yards upriver, and then was able to get good pics of Cali as she came by about 5 minutes later. Mission accomplished.

The Plan time from there to the Basin was 2 hours and 7 minutes, so Rick & Sandy drove up Lakeville Highway to revist the tiny Laveville Marina where we once had had lunch at Pappa's Taverna. Alas, though the sign was still there the Taverna was not. We learned that it had closed in 2013 and the little marina and the Taverna were slowly being rebuilt. We did get some pictures of 4 powerboats heading for the fun at Petaluma YC. Then Sandy found the fun Pub Republic (https://pubrepublic.com/) a few miles up the road for a great lunch.

Between the Lakeville Marina stop and powerboat pics and lunch, it was now just after 1400. We crossed the D Street Bridge at 1422, and there in the river waiting for an opening were Kapai, Cali, another sailboat, and two powerboats. A quick right turn, grabbed an illegal parking spot, and walked back with the camera to capture the opening of the bridge and Kapai and Cali's arrival at 1440. Not bad for a Plan that had predicted a 1436 arrival after 5 hours and 51 minutes on the water.

It turned out to be a good thing that they had arrived when they did. The entire dock was packed with med-moored boats and Kapai and Cali were the very last boats added to the raft. A catamaran that had arrived shortly after them had to tie up at the north side of the basin. Even getting Kapai and Cali secured was a great act of seamanship. Backing an I-36 into a tiny slot is no easy trick. Kapai got it right on a second pass, and Cali wiggled in last very nicely. Check out the pics and video clip below.

Once secure we settled in for a visit and nibbles aboard Kapai and awaited the PYC's Cocktail Contest Judges arrival. The Cocktail Contest Rules call for a Grog drink (think rum) of any kind. This is a long standing tradition as you can see going back to our last fleet visit for Memorial Day 2009. Commodore Egan easily rose to the challenge with his Jack Sparrow Bath. Take 3 parts of black rum, 1 part Grand Marnier, and a dash of Orange Bitters, shake briefly with ice, strain into a cocktail glass, and then, with a helper, flame an orange peel over the top and drop the peel into the glass. That "flaming" bit is quite fun. While one person holds the flame, the creator quickly twists a chunk of peel with the outside toward the flame and there is a shower of little sparkes from the orange oil expelled from the peel. The Judges didn't arrive until almost 1830, and as this goes to press we don't yet know if it captured their votes.

While the Kapai and Cali crews adjourned to the PYC clubhouse about 1900 for the potluck appetizers and the eventual declaration of the contest winners, Rick & Sandy returned to their Land Yacht for the hour and a half drive back home to Mountain View. Stay tuned for hopefully more test and pictures as the weekend wraps up.

Memorial Day Weekend in Petaluma
Commodore Egan's comments

Rick Van Mell did a very nice job covering Islander participants on the Friday of the weekend. On Saturday morning we enjoyed a nice Continental Breakfast at Petaluma YC and then took a stroll around the town. Those, so inclined, donned their Pirate regalia and trundled over to the YC bar for a parade so that judges could award a winner of the contest. Our son Bryce and his girlfriend Reanne looked pretty good but sadly lost out to some Petaluma insiders. People really get in to the costumes!

Before dinner and dancing our Petaluma host's inducted all present Commodores into the Petaluma Navy as long as they agreed to come to the aid of Petaluma in the event they are attacked by say, Rohnert Park. Silly but fun and you get a genuine placard!

Petaluma put out a nice feast of Santa Maria Tip and then on to music and dancing provided by Blues Band, " The Backsliders". Islander owners did us proud with spirited dancing fueled by lot's of beer and wine. Needless to say we got up a little later for breakfast on Sunday.

A highlight of the weekend are the competitive games on Sunday which include a team event assembling a boat out of random parts supplied by the club. They float these in a kiddie pool and add various weights to try to sink the boats Last one floating wins. Total points on all the games wins his weight in beer. These guys know how to have fun.

We opted to go out for dinner Sunday and enjoyed a nice meal at RisiBisi's.

Monday morning all the talk was when to leave with a 9AM low tide. Even fellow Islander owner Frank Burkhardt of Island Girl drove up from Mill Valley to dispense some advice. We originally scheduled a bridge opening at 10:30 but discretion being the better part of valor waited until 11:30 to depart. The turning basin is advertised as 8 feet at low tide but locals say it silted up pretty fast after the last dredging. Well the short story is we never ran aground in the river and made it back to South Beach at 6PM after buddy boating with Kerry and Jennifer out to the G #1 Buoy where we met them on Friday morning.

It was great to see all the modifications Kerry has made to Cali for the Pacific Cup. Can't wait to escort them out the Gate on July 4th.

On behalf of the Islander 36 Association we wish to thank Petaluma YC for hosting the event. Gail Swift aka SquidLips is the lead organizer and really puts on a great program. Can't wait to do it again. And next time we really need to have our cruise chair Matt Callahan and his family avoid calamity and make it up the lazy river.

Rt 37 over Petaluma R.	Kapai already under ...	here comes ...	Cali ...	looking good ...
and happy.	Old railroad bridge	Under Rt 37 ...	heading up river.	Now defunct, but ...
rebuilding ...	docks.	Here come ...	powerboats ...	heading ...
up river ...	nice form ...	headed for PYC!	Waiting for ...	D Street ...
bridge ...	here they come ...	Kapai ...	is through ...	Cali is ...
through ...	into the Basin.	Coming down ...	thanks!	Petaluma YC ...
ready to party ...	flags fly.	The dock ...	is packed ...	all Med-Moored ...
and lined up.	Making room ...	for Kapai ...	lines are ready ...	here we go ...
the crowd awaits ...	nicely done!	Cali is next ...	backing in ...	all secure.

Tight fit!	Jennifer & Kerry	Kapai crew too.	Two headed dog?!	Sign in ...
get goodies bag ...	get name tags ...	party with Depp!	Great bar ...	fun staircase ...
dining is ...	set up ...	from the deck ...	you see the dock.	Back aboard Kapai ...
Rick & Sandy	great hors d'oeuvres ...	The gang's all here.	Flags fly!	Rick' ingredients for ...
Jack Sparrow Bath	the Judges arrive ...	Rick concocts ...	then explains ...	then they taste ...
and confer.	Kathy, Reanne & Bryce	Serious Pirates!	Petaluma Navy Induction	Great music!
Build boats ...	that float ...	until they don't!	Gail Swift aka SquidLips	Frank & Kerry
Cali headed home.

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