Since her launch in 2003, the 65’ Tom Wylie Cat Ketch sailing research vessel has been a very, very busy girl. Summering in the pristine waters of Monterey Bay, escorting groups of school children en masse on floating field trips in conjunction with the Monterey Bay Aquarium, to tagging sharks off the Farallone Islands in the fall. She’s been known venture to Southern California on environmental education tours and sailed up the Sacramento river to deliver documents and VIP’s to the States Capitol. Other times you might see her crew using her as a floating debris collection and tracking missions, nets out pulling in and documenting heaps of trash bound for the great blue, making it less great.
The Derek, doesn’t get a chance to spread her wings as much as she would like. As with many a Wylie designed vessel, and despite her working class girl roots, she has get up and go a plenty. In late April, her crew set out from San Francisco, headed for Santa Cruz in a bit of a blow. The North Westerly’s were hovering in the high 20’s to low 30’s with stronger gusts. Seas were showing 8-12 feet at 13 seconds.
As they departed the security of the Golden Gate and turn south along the Four Fathom Bank, a sneaker rose up and filled the spacious cockpit with green water. “We kinda felt a little vulnerable about then, watch Captain Mark Kocina said “We we a little nervous and decided to play it safe for a while”. Wallowing down the coast with just a reefed main, The Derek M Baylis was still averaging a solid 5-6 knots with quick accelerations to 10 plus as she slid down the face on her aft quarter. After she rounded Pedro then Pillar Points, the crew were able to relax a bit, and eventually shake out the reef.
Soon thereafter the mizzen was deployed, and grimaces soon became grins. By Pescadero, the DMB was wing on wing, cruising in the mid teens and surfing in the high teens. Not that unusual for a Wylie design, but a work boat? A work boat affectionately called the garbage boat by the crew for her trash collecting efforts?
As the approached Año Nuevo, as is often the case the winds filtering off the Pescadero hills produced some extra pressure. Now averaging 15-18 knots, the crew were greeted with an additional blast and a perfect swell set to match…. 19…20…21….grins…22…23….hoots and hollers…24…24.5 knots!!!
While the remainder of the voyage failed to peg the fun meter as seriously as the Año Blast did, the crew managed to keep her surfing all the way to Surf City USA, setting a new personal best of just over 6 hours, door to door, a mark that many an ultralight IRC campaigner would love to have notched in their belt.
Life is more or less back to the grind now, as The Derek M Baylis and crew are stationed at the Monterey Harbor, where their hard work continues in earnest. The largest sailing passenger carrying vessel, rated to 49 passengers, 30 is the self imposed limit for tours and educational voyages. While many of the weekend trips have already been booked by groups via the Monterey Bay Aquarium you can still get on board by using the links below:
http://www.montereybayaquarium.org/e...s_sailing.aspx
http://www.montereybayaquarium.org/e...s_breezes.aspx
The DMB is also available for private Charters, you can book a 2 hour or 3 hour trip with 30 of your closest friends, co workers, associates or family by contacting the Aquarium at addressed above or Sea Life Conservation at http://www.sealifeconservation.org/
Telephone 831.818.6112 email: captain@sealifeconservation.org
In Part 2, We’ll explore in detail some of the finer details of Sea Life Conservation’s efforts in education, research and conservation. We’ll also revisit the boat itself and examine some of it unique attributes!
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