By Dan Hart
Few subjects, if any, have stirred more response to this column than the planned American Sail Training Association Tall Ships Challenge along the Straits of Juan de Fuca and Georgia in August.
As many as 100 “Class A” windjammers were expected to race from Japan to Seattle, then play around the Straits and Puget Sound — visiting Victoria and, hopefully, Port Angeles and Port Townsend, before racing south from Cape Flattery to Southern California in late August.
For nearly a year I’ve received queries from readers all along the Strait about this event, which was billed as the biggest such regatta on the West Coast since the heyday of sailing ships in the merchant trades.
Port Townsend’s Northwest Maritime Center, Wooden Boat Foundation and Northwest School of Wooden Boatbuilding were gearing up with the vision of tall ships once again anchoring in the bay of the Victorian Seaport.
The Port Angeles senior citizens center was thinking about chartering a vessel to view the tall ships as they sailed by Ediz Hook.
Bad news: The event is going to be substantially scaled down.
The rest of Dan Hart’s “On the Waterfront” column appears in today’s Sunday Peninsula Daily News. Click on “Subscribe” to get the PDN delivered to your home or office.