Back when ships had yardarms and young sailors thought nothing of scampering up a ratline to rig a topsail, mothers and wives sang mournfully of the siren sea that took their men away for months or years, and all too often kept them.
Well, the mourning may be less frequent today but the allure of the sea has not gone away. There are kids — perhaps even one on your block — who hear the call of wind and water and spend their weekends, regardless of season, in or around the sailboats of the Peninsula Youth Sailing Foundation in the harbor at Redwood City.
The foundation, now in its fifth year, is the inspiration of Portola Valley resident and former sailor Eric Anderson. The foundation offers sailing instruction, including competitive sailing, for kids ages 7 and older in age-appropriate boats for a fee of $450 per quarter, not including occasional regatta fees.
Four kids are enrolled on full scholarships, courtesy of a few “very, very generous parents” and the Sequoia Yacht Club, says Mr. Anderson, who adds: “Anybody who comes to us and wants to sail, we let them sail.”
Kids ages 7 to 18 are welcome. At the moment, 32 are enrolled in the program, says Mr. Anderson. A typical outing to a regatta includes about 24 to 30 kids for 12 to 15 two-person boats, he says, with one skipper and one crew member per boat.
The boats are dinghies: the 7-foot, single-sail Optimist for young kids; and for older kids, the 13-foot Flying Junior, a pure racing craft that has a main and a jib sail and can be rigged with a spinnaker — the spectacular but high-maintenance balloon-like sail used for running downwind.
The foundation has one paid employee: the head coach Dan Brandt, an accomplished sailor and a former coach at the San Francisco Yacht Club. Mr. Brandt, 29, says he learned to sail small boats on Idaho lakes.
Mr. Brandt has raced small boats internationally, including in several world championships. After six months under his tutelage, most kids sail well enough to avoid running into other boats, he says.
Chris Huang, a resident of Menlo Park and a junior at Summit Preparatory High School, has found happiness; he’s been enrolled in the foundation sailing program for two years.
“Even when you get good, you (refine) your own particular style that’s built on everybody else’s,” Chris says. “I’ll come here until they kick me out. … I love sailing.”
Chris says his dad owns four boats, including a 44-foot sailboat, and that the family has taken long trips along both coasts. He was home-schooled for a while.
Matt Van Rensselaer of Portola Valley has sailed and raced for three years in foundation boats. “I like sailing because it’s not so much a physical sport,” he says. “The biggest, strongest guy out there is not winning. It’s the person who thinks the best.”
Matt says he likes sailing because it’s easy to make friends and because the travel to tournaments and the variety of people he meets there seem more interesting than would be the case in other sports.
“I just want to get better, to be a top sailor in the world, to be good enough to get paid for sailing,” he says. That’s not all he wants to do: he says he has serious career plans in the fields of engineering and architecture.
A sailing family
Eric Anderson runs a real estate brokerage in his day job, but he sailed for most of his life. He used to sail his 27-footer in San Francisco Bay with his wife as crew, but abandoned it after she complained about the constant battering winds that blow across the bay.He sailed single-handed for a while, but says he didn’t enjoy it. “It wasn’t fun without her.”
He sold his boat. Asked if it was a hard decision, he replied: “Divorce would have been harder.”
One day his son, who hadn’t experienced the family’s sailing days, asked his dad if he’d ever heard of a “Laser,” a popular single-sail 12-foot boat.
From his wife came the words “Oh no,” Mr. Anderson recalls with a smile. His two sons are in now in the University of California and both sail for their schools, he says.
The Peninsula Youth Sailing Foundation came about as a result of five parents who wanted their kids to learn to sail, Mr. Anderson says.
With money the parents donated, he bought 10 Flying Junior sailboats, then hired a coach and started lessons. A donated portable building came later on land donated by the port of Redwood City in exchange for occasional sailing outings for kids at risk.
INFORMATION
Beginner and intermediate sailing classes are running through August 14 at the Redwood City harbor. For more information on classes and on the Peninsula Youth Sailing Foundation, go to pysf.us or call Eric Anderson at 854-1048.Most Popular
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