Inset; 'Flashgirl' passes Yellow Bluff on her way to the Gate, the open ocean, and maybe the Marquesas. Inset; Commodore and Nancy.
such as that have been Commodore's stock in trade since — well, since long before we started this magazine 28 years ago. And if Commodore were delayed by the delivery, it would make the South Pacific trip problematic, as it would then be hurricane season between California and French Polynesia. He and Nancy, despite having a boat loaded with food and other supplies, might have to wait until next season. "If you're stuck here for the summer, you might as well just hang around and wait for the start of the Ha-Ha in the fall," somebody in our office suggested. Commodore, who had one heart attack years ago, looked as though he were about to have another. But he quickly recovered. "Right," he said with a wry smile. For those not familiar with Commodore, he's done it all in sailing — except, oddly enough, been a commodore. He acquired the nickname when he was a baby aboard the Wanderbird, his parent's former Elbe River pilot schooner that had
been built in Germany in the late 1800s. The way the story goes, his mother opened a drawer to reveal her son to a visitor, who exclaimed, "And this must be the commodore!" The nickname has stuck for more than 70 years. Commodore is an old-school sailor, having crossed the Atlantic something like six times by the time he was four years old. There's great footage of him as a youngster using the decks of Wanderbird as a playground during a stormy rounding of Cape Horn in the documentary 50 South To 50 South. And he used to win bets by climbing hand-over-hand up shrouds to the top of tall masts. He's raced Six Meters for the St. Francis, ran a crewed charterboat in the Caribbean, driven maxi's in the Pan Am Clipper Cup, and delivered boats all over the world. He also enraged a lot of people by declaring the revered Cal 40 to be a "crummy boat". Having sailed with most of the great sailors of the last 50 years, more recently he's dedicated himself to two big
projects. The first was a long dissertation — after delivering our catamaran Profligate from Puerto Vallarta to San Diego — describing in great detail what is philosophically and physically wrong with our boat. It's a document we treasure as being 'pure Commodore'. His second big project was building the hi-tech Flashgirl from a hull and deck in Sonoma over a period of seven years. Although he's raced her to Hawaii, he's never really cruised his ultimate cruiser. But it would be a shame if he didn't do it pretty soon. — latitude 05/09/05 Content — CT 41 Mike & Kathleen Raymond Harry Arthur, Crew (Santa Barbara) I, crewman Harry Arthur, am sitting here at the nav station of the Content, listening to the water rushing by the hull. We're not underway, but are lying to a mooring in Bahia Caraquez, Ecuador, where the tide is ebbing strongly. The speed of the water is augmented by the flow of the Rio Chome, which was flooded by recent rains. Debris — in the form of logs, islands of river hyacinth, and mats of grass — rushes by on either side of our hull. There are about 30 other cruising boats here, all but one of them sailboats. Most are American or Canadian, but I can also see German, Swedish, Swiss and Danish flags flying from nearby backstays. We left the Flamingo anchorage at the southern end of the Panama Canal in the last week in March, and spent a few days in the Perlas Islands, where we scrubbed the bottom, stowed the skiff on deck, and generally made ready for the passage to Ecuador. When we deemed the time was right, we upped anchor and headed south. We had light winds on the nose Some of the 22 new moorings ready to be set by the Puerto Amistad Marina in Bahia Caraquez, Ecuador. Cruisers love the place. TRIPP MARTIN
SPREAD, LATITUDE/RICHARD; INSET, COURTESY FLASHGIRL
IN LATITUDES