Eagle lands at Newport Beach

Deirdre Newman

Nicki Cotsworth couldn’t wait another week to see her husband.

He had already been gone for nearly three weeks on a sailing adventure

aboard Orange Coast College’s Alaska Eagle.

So on Saturday, Cotsworth -- who lives in St. Louis -- hopped on a

plane and flew to Orange County so she could surprise him as the Eagle

made its triumphant return to port in Newport Beach .

Cotsworth created a sign that would fit in the bottom of her suitcase

and broughthusband Fred’s favorite snacks -- chips and Gatorade.

And then she waited some more.

On Tuesday, Cotsworth boarded a tugboat at OCC’s School of Sailing and

Seamanship and took a brief ride to meet her husband at the entrance to

Newport Harbor.

As the tugboat sailed into view of the Alaska Eagle -- a 65-foot

sailing vessel -- Cotsworth jubilantly waved her sign.

“I was thrilled,” Fred Cotsworth said, beaming.

While Fred Cotsworth, 56, received the most emotional homecoming, the

arrival of the Alaska Eagle under sunny skies was highly anticipated by

almost all eight passengers. They had just completed the last leg of a

13-month, 25,000-mile journey from Newport Beach to Antarctica and back.

“It feels good to be home, but we kept saying we didn’t want it to

end,” said Robi Dalrymple, 26, who handles marine maintenance for the

college and was the youngest passenger on the journey.

The Alaska Eagle was donated to the college in 1982. Originally built

to race around the world, it has banked more than 200,000 miles with OCC

sailing students on board.

On June 27, 2001, it began a 13-month odyssey from Newport Beach that

included Hawaii, Tahiti, South America and the Antarctic. While most OCC

sailing classes are open to anyone, boarding the Eagle takes a certain

level of skill and is by application only. Each leg can handle up to 10

students and a crew of three.

In addition to drinking in the breathtaking scenery around them, the

passengers learn useful nautical skills, such as knot tying, life raft

operation, anchoring and navigating.

The skipper and first mate -- Rich and Sheri Crowe -- have been

navigating the Eagle for the past 20 years.

Although they had already visited many of the exotic places on this

itinerary, Rich Crowe said he considered the trip to be especially

aggressive for a sail training school. Nonetheless, the trip was a

rousing success, he said.

“It went flawlessly because of preparation, perspiration and

determination,” he said.

The only hitch occurred when part of the sail broke about 1,000 miles

away from Newport Beach. The wind, blowing about 25 knots, ripped a

12-foot-long tear through the sail, Dalrymple said, resulting in an “all

hands on deck” call.

They took the sail down and hung it in the cabin. For eight hours, the

passengers and crew stitched it back together. With four people on one

side and four on the other, they passed sewing needles back and forth

until the sail was repaired.

While most of the participants only participate on one leg of the

trip, one of the passengers had enough good sailing karma to participate

on two legs.

Sheree Austin-Gagne, 46, sailed from Easter Island to Tahiti, flew

home to Marina del Rey for a few weeks, then rejoined the Eagle on the

last leg from Hawaii to Newport Beach. The two legs had decidedly

different flavors, she said.

“The [first] one was more like island-hopping,” Austin-Gagne said. “On

this trip, the marine life was incredible. We had two to three whale

sightings and four to five dolphin sightings.”

Both legs, however, provided awe-inspiring scenery, she said.

“There’s some things you can’t describe, like the serenity [of the

ocean] and 360-degree sunrises and sunsets,” Austin-Gagne said.

Many of the passengers said the once-in-a-lifetime experience stoked

their sailing passion to embark on more adventures.

“I learned you have to be very resourceful and have to have more

courage than I thought to face big winds and big waves,” Fred Cotsworth

said. “I’ve just been an accountant all my life. This is what people

dream about when they sit at their desks all day.”

* Deirdre Newman covers education. She may be reached at (949)

574-4221 or by e-mail at o7 deirdre.newman@latimes.comf7 .