Recently I read the remark that enjoyment of a boat is inversely proportional to the overall length. This is often true. After sailing with various fleets of larger boats, we came to rest in the San Francisco Pelican flock. Many cruising sailors are familiar with the twelve foot long, lug rigged boat as Pelicans roam Puget Sound, the San Juans, and the Gulf Islands all summer long. You can find them everywhere. One summer, not long ago, three boatloads of Pelicaneers were sailing back to Lund, BC after a picnic in the Copelands. As we approached the dock, another Pelican was setting out, deeply loaded, heading to one of the remote islands with weeks, perhaps a months, supplies.
There are even more remote possibilities of a very small boat. Thanks to the Pelican Class web site, we met Ignacio Balbin who owns the first Pelican built in Spain. The boat was built eleven years ago and has inspired five other sailors in Spain to build Pelicans. The Spanish fleet is based mostly in the province of Asturias where they tend to gather to day sail and race during the long European holiday in August.
Terry, our daughter, had been teaching in Morocco, so she flew to Spain, to meet Ignacio and next day they came to the airport to collect Dave and me. It was a quick drive to San-Juan-de-la-Arena in the Provence of Asturias. He stopped by our B & B so we could park our luggage, then off for a sail. Ignacio had taken Terry for an introductory sail the day before. So after a quick tour of the town from the beach to the hillsides, he took us down to the river where his Pelican was moored, suggesting that we three should take her out for an afternoon sail and he would follow with a friend on a larger boat. We understood the feeling, it was a chance for him to get pictures of his boat under way!! So we set the sails and pushed off. Somewhat to the surprise of Ignacio and his friend who were accustomed to leaving and returning under power.
We sailed from the slip, carefully keeping clear of various underwater obstructions Terry had noted during her first sail. We tacked up the channel, working out to sea, but the rollers straight from the Bay of Biscay made for slow progress against the tide. So we elected to explore the river. It was a grand run upstream with the rising tide. The boat balanced well, requiring little pressure on the gracefully shaped hiking stick. In the wind shadow of a small castle we slowed, moving with the tide, sailing close ashore to see old Spanish fishing boats, long ago beached. There were shallows to avoid at river bends, reefs built up by side channels. Eventually, at a low bridge, limit of sailing, we turned back. We reached alongside boats moored to the river banks and saw raised eyebrows as people aboard recognized Ignacio’s boat but not us. When he and his friend came along in the other boat, they realized we were using the boat with his approval, and waved. It had been a fine sailing day. The area is much like the Oregon/ Northern California coast. The Spanish who settled California would have felt right at home. Villages were built on steep hillsides, or on the river delta. The backdrop was steep mountains covered with green trees and low flying clouds
Ignacio said the moorages for private boats are quite new in the area. Before he introduced his boat, moorings were mostly for the fishing fleet and fishing tenders. Now there are floating moorage for many boats both power and sail.
Another day, he took us to the next town westward which is more of a tourist center. The main street ending in boat a ramp where fishermen had, for centuries, pulled their boats ashore to sell their catches and dry their nets on the walls. The villages of quaint fishermen’s homes are experiencing the same building boom as most of the world.
On a hilltop above the town we met Ignacio’s brother his wife who live in a lovely new home with a fabulous view of the town below and the ocean beyond. They showed us their home and invited us to lunch before we went sailing again.
The second day, Ignacio simply said to have a good time sailing, and please reorganize the rigging as we would on our own boats. So we had a happy time undoing this, setting up that to increase the fullness of the sail, lead the jib a bit closer, a bit of this and that. The rollers from the sea were larger than before so we explored the harbor of the town across the bay and went up the river again.
In the evening, Ignacio took us into the mountains to see his childhood home and later, much later, to dinner. The problem with visiting Spain is the siesta in the afternoon and dinner late at night. We, of course had been sailing all afternoon, not sleeping, and by ten at night when the restaurants began to open, were hard pressed to stay awake to eat, much less make polite, or even intelligible, conversation.
One of the great pleasures of sailing a One-Design is to see a boat built from the same plans as yours, but with subtle variations and to meet people from very different backgrounds who are attracted to the same class and to find your boat would be happy sailing in distant waters.
Jean Gosse