DANA POINT : Visitors to Step Back in Time at Festival

For landlubbers who have always longed to experience life on a real turn-of-the-century clipper ship, this is your weekend.

The annual Tallships Festival, a celebration of the 19th-Century sailing industry that served Orange County settlers, will take place Saturday and Sunday in Dana Point Harbor from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on both days.

It’s a historical journey into the past, when trading vessels were loaded down with supplies for California settlers and embarked on a round trip from the East Coast that could take up to two years.

Each year, the event stars the Pilgrim, the Orange County Marine Institute’s full-size reproduction of the ship that brought Richard Henry Dana into what would become Dana Point Harbor.

Somewhere off the waters near Newport Beach on Saturday, the Pilgrim will meet the Kaisei Maru, a 151-foot Japanese brigantine that is touring the world. At 10 a.m., the two will lead a parade of pleasure boats into the harbor to kick off the weekend of festivities.

Organizers hope to open a window to 19th-Century sea life and give an accurate portrayal of what it was like to crew on a sailing vessel.

“There are a lot of myths about the romance of the sea that people on land aren’t aware of,” said Karin Deanda, a Marine Institute spokeswoman. “We hope to make the experience come alive for people.”

The Pilgrim crew will dress in sailing togs of the era and lead the public on tours of the docked vessel starting at 2:30 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. The Kaisei Maru can be visited Sunday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

But more than a walk-through tour, the festival will show through a series of demonstrations how sailors kept their brigs afloat.

Some will be hands-on experiences that the public can participate in, such as a heaving line throw, which involves flinging the heavy mooring ropes ashore. Other demonstrations will showcase more complex tasks, such as marlinespike seamanship, which deals with the many ways rope was spliced for on-board tasks.

Life on the ocean was also a musical experience. Sailors will show how time was passed by warbling popular sea chanteys of the 19th Century.

There will be a heavy emphasis on maritime arts, as well as crafts from early California rancho days.

Booths will offer such crafts as scrimshaw, woodworking, leather work and silver-making. A ship’s cabinet maker will show how woodworkers dealt with size, fitting an everyday piece of furniture into the cramped confines of a ship.

The festival will be held on the grounds of the Marine Institute, which is at the end of Dana Point Harbor Drive in the harbor. For further information, call (714) 496-2274.