The Yacht Club
14" X 18" oil on canvas
Original art is sold
This is Christina Cameron, best friend of my daughter Sarah, here age 10. Christina, decked out in her finest yachting apparel, casts an eye over the ocean from the Ogden Point breakwater in Victoria, B.C. Ogden Point is the finish line for the Swiftsure International Yacht Race, held in the spring each year. Christina and Sarah are BFFs (Best Friends Forever). Christina’s family moved to Edmonton, Alberta in 2011 ... here, they are back in Victoria for a visit.
I was born in Edmonton, and I remember my tenure with the 104th Street Yacht Club and its spring regatta. There was not much strolling the waterfront promenade in navy and white. For me, Edmonton’s yachting season consisted of drifting popsicle stick-boats under a winter’s worth of street ice, undercut by the spring runoff. I was five or six at the time.
We would spend hours honing one end of the stick to a perfect point on the concrete curb, in an effort to gain the edge on the competition. We also decorated each stick carefully, with felt pens or crayon. At the start line we jockeyed for position, looking for the strongest current at the upstream edge of the ice drift. On a three count, we’d launch our craft and watch them disappear into the unknown. Then we’d run around to the downstream side and wait to see whose yacht would emerge first.
I once asked my father to make me a custom yacht for the racing season. In “Designs Of Canada,” his big warehouse shop full f tools, I watched him sculpt the hull on the band saw then refine the form on the sander. Wood was the material of choice in the day, as carbon fibre was still a dream. Later, I painted it with “real” paint ... bright red. In the history of gutter racing, there had never been a finer craft. Alas, on its maiden voyage, it passed cleanly under the ice, but was washed out into the street and pulverized by a passing car.
I’m now an active member of the Bluewater Cruising Association and spend a fair amount of time at the Royal Victoria Yacht Club, working on a friend's boat. But it’s never quite as much fun as the Annual 104th Street Runoff Classic. Mark Heine
14" X 18" oil on canvas
Original art is sold
This is Christina Cameron, best friend of my daughter Sarah, here age 10. Christina, decked out in her finest yachting apparel, casts an eye over the ocean from the Ogden Point breakwater in Victoria, B.C. Ogden Point is the finish line for the Swiftsure International Yacht Race, held in the spring each year. Christina and Sarah are BFFs (Best Friends Forever). Christina’s family moved to Edmonton, Alberta in 2011 ... here, they are back in Victoria for a visit.
I was born in Edmonton, and I remember my tenure with the 104th Street Yacht Club and its spring regatta. There was not much strolling the waterfront promenade in navy and white. For me, Edmonton’s yachting season consisted of drifting popsicle stick-boats under a winter’s worth of street ice, undercut by the spring runoff. I was five or six at the time.
We would spend hours honing one end of the stick to a perfect point on the concrete curb, in an effort to gain the edge on the competition. We also decorated each stick carefully, with felt pens or crayon. At the start line we jockeyed for position, looking for the strongest current at the upstream edge of the ice drift. On a three count, we’d launch our craft and watch them disappear into the unknown. Then we’d run around to the downstream side and wait to see whose yacht would emerge first.
I once asked my father to make me a custom yacht for the racing season. In “Designs Of Canada,” his big warehouse shop full f tools, I watched him sculpt the hull on the band saw then refine the form on the sander. Wood was the material of choice in the day, as carbon fibre was still a dream. Later, I painted it with “real” paint ... bright red. In the history of gutter racing, there had never been a finer craft. Alas, on its maiden voyage, it passed cleanly under the ice, but was washed out into the street and pulverized by a passing car.
I’m now an active member of the Bluewater Cruising Association and spend a fair amount of time at the Royal Victoria Yacht Club, working on a friend's boat. But it’s never quite as much fun as the Annual 104th Street Runoff Classic. Mark Heine
