The Saga of Crescent City’s Japanese Boat Continues

Adding to a small boat’s more than 5,000-mile  journey is where it came ashore — less than a mile from a  multi-million-dollar project to repair damage done to a harbor from a tsunami resulting from a March 2011 earthquake. Now authorities in Del Norte County have tracked down the owner of that vessel which washed up on South Beach in early April 2013.

It came from the coastal Japanese town of Rikuzentakata, where the tsunami took the lives of 2,000 people and left only three buildings standing.

A photograph of the goose barnacle-covered boat posted to Rikuzentakata city’s Facebook page lead to the boat’s owner: a high school teacher. The social media page also showed the boats handwritten Japanese characters of  “Takata-kou-kou,” which when translated, reads “Takata High School.”

This is the second find for Rikuzentakata. In April 2012, a soccer ball was found on an Alaskan island with a student’s name on it and returned.

Now,  Takata High School would like to have the boat back and Del Norte County officials are working to make it happen.