Their Tall Ships Have Come In : Vessels Dock With Festival in Tow

Maritime history came alive Saturday as two grand, old-fashioned ships met in the harbor and raised their sails together.

Hundreds of nautical buffs gathered at the South County shoreline to watch the Pilgrim, a replica of a 19th-Century trading vessel, enter its home port along with the Kaisei Maru, a Japanese brigantine that is in the midst of a cruise around the world. Both are tall ships--named not for their height but for their masts--and carry 14 sails.

“These ships are rare,” said Stanley Cummings, director of the Orange County Marine Institute, host of Dana Point’s seventh annual Tall Ships Festival. “It’s really special to bridge international boundaries and touch people who are keeping alive a skill and a memory that’s important.”

Built in 1948 and remodeled during the 1970s, the 130-foot Pilgrim is a replica of the ship Richard Henry Dana Jr. sailed into Dana Point Harbor--then called Capistrano Point--in 1834.

As the story goes, the young Dana was too ill to continue his studies at Harvard University, so he joined the crew of the Pilgrim, which sailed around South America and up the California coast, collecting cow hides to sell back in New England. Dana later returned to Harvard, became a lawyer and wrote about the struggles of sailors in “Two Years Before the Mast.”

“California was quite a bit different then,” said Dan Stetson, director of maritime affairs for OCMI. “He said Dana Point was the only romantic spot.”

Because he made the spot famous with this compliment, the community was named for Dana in 1884, and the marine institute brought the Pilgrim to port in the harbor in 1981.

Year-round, the Pilgrim is “a laboratory of learning,” according Harry Helling, associate director of the marine institute. About 15,000 schoolchildren spend overnight field trips aboard the ship each year, reliving the rough conditions Dana wrote about in his book.

Each summer the 50 volunteers who maintain the Pilgrim set sail for about two weeks, returning home in time for the Tall Ships Festival, which includes traditional folk music and art booths displaying jewelry, scrimshaw, ship models and seascapes. The festival continues today, with both ships open for touring from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

To enhance the old-time atmosphere, dozens of festival-goers donned 19th-Century sailing outfits. Two bearded men with bandannas around their necks strummed the banjo and tapped out tunes on the flute, singing about the sea. And the Pilgrim’s carpenter, Jay Sponagle, had his foot-powered lathe out to carve the wooden pins that hold the ships lines.

“Sometimes it’s like a fantasy to be reliving this,” said Pilgrim Capt. Jim Wehan, a 22-year resident of Dana Point. “Everything is done in the old way.”

Clad in a double-breasted, brass-buttoned navy blazer with white ruffled cuffs peeking out the end of his sleeves and bushy sideburns sneaking out from under his sailor’s cap, Wehan showed off the captain’s quarters, where a 13-year-old crew member brought his meals during the 16-day voyage.

On deck is an old-fashioned bell, rung every half an hour to mark the progression of each watch, and a vintage cannon, fired twice daily before the raising and lowering of the national flag. Wehan is always addressed as “Captain,” and his requests are always answered with an official “Aye, aye, sir.”

The Pilgrim has two masts and 14 sails, with 140 different lines to control the equipment. The crew, ranging in age from 13 to 72, sleeps in cramped bunks tucked along the sides under the deck--space that in Dana’s day was used to stock the hides while crewmen piled atop one another in the back of the ship.

Also underneath is a three-cylinder diesel engine.

“It’s modern-day. We’ve got to get where we’re going,” shrugs Wehan, 55, to explain away the engine. “When the wind doesn’t blow, we run the engine.”

Anchored less than 100 yards down the harbor was the 151-foot Kaisei, a modern version of the square-sailed tall ship.

Built in Poland, the ship set sail in 1991 and this spring joined the quincentennial celebration of Christopher Columbus’ voyage to the New World with regattas in Spain and then in New York on the Fourth of July.

Sponsored by a private Japanese company, the ship invites novices from around the world to experience 10- to 14-day voyages.

“We’re not trying to teach them anything about sailing, we’re trying to teach them about themselves,” said Capt. Chris Blake, acknowledging that life aboard his ship is a vacation cruise compared to the Pilgrim. “They have to overcome their fear of the sea, their fear of heights--and they have to do it together.”