Tag: yachts

Floating lab Gene Chaser visits San Diego.

A very unusual yacht with a very unusual name is visiting San Diego. I saw the research yacht Gene Chaser this morning docked at Broadway Pier.

Gene Chaser is essentially a super high tech floating laboratory. I had to search the internet to learn about it. This article explains the ship’s capabilities and the aim of its owner: scientist, inventor and entrepreneur Dr. Jonathan Rothberg.

The yacht is fitted in such a way that technological breakthroughs can be made while traveling the world’s oceans seeking new solutions and knowledge from nature.

The article explains: To support the fast pace of creating and using new technology, GENE CHASER has extensive rapid prototyping capabilities — best in class 3D printing, CNC, laser cutting, and electronics fabrication are all on board. All of which complement the cutting edge molecular biology laboratory and high power computational infrastructure at the heart of the ship.

Comparing my photos with that in the article, it’s apparent major changes have recently been made to the vessel. It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen before!

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Ex-Russian superyacht in National City!

Have you seen that superyacht docked very strangely down in National City?

I walked to Pepper Park today, and when I ventured out onto the fishing pier, I took photos of the large yacht tied up on one side of the National City Marine Terminal. The ships you usually see around here are those gigantic sheer-sided roll-on/roll-off (RORO) ships that transport cars.

When I got home, I found this article!

I learned that this superyacht, Amadea, was seized by the United States off of Fiji earlier this year. It had allegedly belonged to sanctioned Russian billionaire oligarch Suleiman Kerimov.

According to the article, the superyacht might be auctioned off. Anyone out there looking for a nice boat?

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Thanks for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!

I post new blogs pretty often. If you like discovering new things, bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and swing on by occasionally!

I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!

World’s largest single-masted yacht returns!

The world’s largest single-masted yacht has returned to San Diego!

The M5, originally called the Mirabella V, is now docked on the Embarcadero near the Maritime Museum of San Diego. You can find it directly across from the County Administration Building.

I spotted the towering mast while walking nearby, so I had to go take a look. That mind-blowing mast, over 290 feet high, is visible from many streets downtown!

I first saw the M5 in San Diego eight years ago behind the convention center and blogged about it here. Read that old blog post (including its comments) to learn more about this incredible sailboat.

It took these photographs this morning. It’s hard to depict the staggering size of this sloop-rigged super yacht. Suffice it to say, the mast rises higher than many downtown San Diego buildings!

You can see the mast from the other side of the County Administration Building in the next photo. (The exterior of the historic building is being painted.)

UPDATE!

The first weekend of October I noticed the M5 had moved to a spot behind the San Diego Convention Center–where I first saw it eight years ago…

Yes, it’s enormous!

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Oldest locally built yacht in San Diego is restored.

The old 1902 yacht Butcher Boy has returned to the Maritime Museum of San Diego. And the historically important boat is in perfectly restored condition!

Butcher Boy is our city’s oldest locally built yacht and workboat.

For many years, as it was being restored, Butcher Boy was located at Spanish Landing under the North Harbor Drive Bridge. I posted a blog with some early stage photographs of it being worked on almost four years ago here.

Now that Butcher Boy is back in perfect sailing condition, the handsome sloop has been visiting local yacht clubs and participating in races.

Butcher Boy was built to be very fast on the water. A hundred years ago it would fly across San Diego Bay to meet incoming ships and offer them fresh provisions. Speed gave the boat a winning advantage over all would-be competitors!

I took a few photographs of the restored yacht this weekend as I walked along the Embarcadero.

You can find detailed descriptions and many photographs concerning Butcher Boy’s restoration on the Maritime Museum website here. Then read about its return to life here!

I took the following photo of a stripped down Butcher Boy at Spanish Landing back in 2018…

Here is Butcher Boy now docked at the Maritime Museum of San Diego…

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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!

A secret place for High Flight in Coronado.

In Coronado, in a secret place overlooking the Coronado Yacht Club, there’s a shady nook where the human spirit can find High Flight.

High Flight

Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds — and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of — wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov’ring there,
I’ve chased the shouting wind along and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long delirious burning blue
I’ve topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or even eagle flew.
And, while with silent, lifting mind I’ve trod
The high, untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.

–John Gillespie Magee, Jr.

John Gillespie Magee, Jr. was an American serving with the Royal Canadian Air Force in England during World War II. On December 11, 1941, at the age of 19, his Spitfire accidentally collided with another plane and he crashed to his death. Learn more about him here.

If you’d like to sit on this special bench in Coronado, and gaze quietly out at the world’s beauty, make your way to the corner of Glorietta Boulevard and Ynez Place.

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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!

Sparks, scrapes and chisels at the Maritime Museum!

Lots of fascinating activity today at the Maritime Museum of San Diego!

As I walked about, I noticed volunteers and sail crew members were working on several very different vessels in the museum’s world-famous collection.

Sparks were flying from the black sail of the B-39 Soviet-era Russian submarine. Its life, sadly, has come to an end. Preparations are underway to tow the badly rusted Foxtrot-class diesel electric submarine to Mexico where it will be scrapped.

After watching guys using a torch on the sub’s outer hull, I walked to the far end of the Maritime Museum’s barge where the Robert Sharp’s stern was being restored. A friendly worker with a heat gun was crackling old varnish, which was then scraped off.

When I stepped onto the deck of the historic steam yacht Medea, I noticed a woodworker carefully repairing the boat’s wooden rail where it had split.

The elegant Medea has a fascinating history.

Did you know that, in addition to Medea being a pleasure yacht that cruised the isles and lochs of Scotland, it was used by France during World War I, and by the British Royal Navy and Norwegian Navy during World War II?

Learn much more here!

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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!

Sunset photos at Embarcadero Marina Park South.

This evening before sunset I arrived at Embarcadero Marina Park South.

I walked out on the pier and watched the patient fishermen. San Diego Bay was glowing, peaceful.

I watched a Dole container ship loading at the 10th Avenue Marine Terminal, then gazed at luxurious yachts docked behind the Convention Center.

As I walked along I spotted a heron behind Joe’s Crab Shack. Then I circled back to the walkway that leads to the newly finished Rady Shell at Jacobs Park, where the San Diego Symphony will be performing this summer. Welcoming banners are now up.

For a few minutes I watched guys playing hoops on the public basketball courts.

The sun finally began setting behind boats in the Marriott Marina.

I headed home.

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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!

Future Champion at San Diego Yacht Club.

Another excellent sculpture by Encinitas-based artists T.J. Dixon and James Nelson can be seen beside the entrance to the San Diego Yacht Club in Point Loma. The public artwork, created in collaboration with Brian Thomas of Thomas Marine, is titled Future Champion. It was dedicated in 2010.

A bronze young sailor, wearing sunglasses, appears to be piloting a sailboat in solo competition. It’s a fantastic sculpture that really captures the essence of being out on the water, one hand holding the rudder while eyes carefully watch the wind in the sails.

The artists’ work includes another similar sculpture I recently blogged about–the sailor high on a mast holding a spyglass in front of the Silver Gate Yacht Club. See that great sculpture here!

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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!

You can easily explore Cool San Diego Sights by using the search box on my blog’s sidebar. Or click a tag! There are thousands upon thousands of photos for you to enjoy!

Sculpted sailor on mast at Silver Gate Yacht Club.

A fantastic sculpture rises into the sky in front of the Silver Gate Yacht Club on Shelter Island.

The artwork, by renowned Encinitas-based artists T.J. Dixon and James Nelson, depicts a sailor high atop a ship’s mast holding a spyglass, searching for land. On a plaque at the sculpture’s base is a poem titled Homecoming by John Alger.

I’ve transcribed the first stanza:

When sailors set for distant shore, with songs upon their ears
They dream of seas both fair and strong, to leave behind the tears
Of loves and those who dwell on land, and ne’er know the sea
Or ports o’ call in distant land, this yearning to be free…

The sculpture–mast and figure–is made of steel and bronze. The sculpture was created in collaboration with Brian Thomas of Thomas Marine. It was dedicated in 2011.

I’ve photographed other great sculptures by T.J. Dixon and James Nelson all around San Diego. You can see them here and here and here and here and here!

Plaque at base of the Silver Gate Yacht Club sculpture includes the poem Homecoming by John Alger.
Plaque at base of the Silver Gate Yacht Club sculpture includes the poem Homecoming by John Alger. (Click this photo and it will enlarge for easier reading.)

Sculpture of sailor on mast with spyglass, by artists T.J. Dixon and James Nelson, at San Diego's Silver Gate Yacht Club on Shelter Island.
Sculpture of sailor on mast with spyglass, by artists T.J. Dixon and James Nelson, at San Diego’s Silver Gate Yacht Club on Shelter Island.

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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!

An enormous sailing yacht, way up in the air!

Look what I saw as I walked past the Driscoll Mission Bay Boat Yard yesterday. A gigantic sailing yacht, suspended way up in the air!

That towering mast appeared about as high as a five-story building!

How did that enormous boat get up there?

Now that’s one peculiar sight!

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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!