Lost Coast Big River Row 8-11-07

[Thorne]

Drove up to Mendocino yesterday for the Lost Coast chapter of the TSCA's Big River Row.

We launched from the beach near the highway bridge and had a quiet row up about 4 miles. I didn't see any ospreys, but several sealions came a long way up the tidal part of the river. Note the fuzzy photo of the small reproduction of Gardner's Maine log-driving bateau -- the builder said he'd make it longer next time, as his 12' or 13' version just doesn't have the waterline for distance rowing.

I was thinking happy thoughts about sailing back, so of course we had some strong winds on the nose for our downriver row. Everyone else was smart and left their sailing rigs and spars at home.

After the row we had a very nice potluck at the "Swallow" home just up the hill between Big and Little Rivers, where the boats were lined up very nicely on their trailers in the field by the pond.

http://www.luckhardt.com/brrow07

http://www.luckhardt.com/brrow07/images/brrow5.jpg

[elf]

Mendocino's a long way from Usal. How big is the Lost Coast district?

[Thorne]

Wot's Usal?

The "Lost Coast" is a rather vague term for the section of coastline where even Hwy 1 has to run inland - so it depends on who you ask.

http://a1608.g.akamai.net/7/1608/1365/f0963126a51d4e/away.com/gifs/states/ca/m_lost.gif
http://gorp.away.com/gorp/location/ca/lost_co1.htm

[elf]

Usal's the river that flows into the ocean just north of where Rt. 1 turns inland. It's a substantial distance N of Mendocino.

Check out this page

http://www.californiacoastline.org/cgi-bin/image.cgi?image=200502816&mode=sequential&flags=0&year=2005

[Steve Paskey]

Thanks for the pictures, Thorne! I wish I could have been there, but I had to spend a good chunk of the weekend preparing for my first week of teaching. Plus, I moved to Sacramento without a boat. (Know of a nice small boat for oars and sail that might be for sale?)

[Thorne]

No worries, Steve, the SF/Sac chapter of the TSCA is very active in the Sac and Delta areas.
http://www.tsca.net/Sacramento/

PM me with your price range and storage/transport setup -- i.e. best choice = a 17' boat on a trailer, or a 14' ply cartopper.