The Veer-of-Idiocy

The day of the Mahurangi Regatta was approaching – Saturday 25 Jan and I was filled with anticipation. Charlie hitched me up to the Vitara early and we were the first to arrive and begin rigging.

That was the last time we were first all day.

Again we tied up to Maria Tomasia – it was great to see her again and Charlie and David caught up and reminisced over the Tall Ships Race they entered earlier in January up in the Bay of Islands (I wondered where he disappeared to for 10 days and why Colleen had brasso stains on her fingers).

We headed out early for the 12pm start hoping to be first over the line. Charlie was planning to use his GPS to achieve split second timing – David just laughed.

During his pre-start manoeuvres we carefully performed a tack so the GPS track would show the precise angle between port and starboard close hauled courses under the conditions of the day – exactly 100 degrees.

 

In the end the start came and went and we crossed the line about 5 minutes later.

The light breeze was very frustrating as the competitors with bigger sails pulled ahead. At one point I was wondering what Charlie was up to as we veered off course – he was trying to use his chart plotter to pick the point to tack – like an idiotic millennial on a smart phone. We lost one position due to that.

It was fun competing with some nearby rivals but the leaders were way ahead. I must say Charlie got his act together after the Veer-of-Idiocy and chose the tack perfectly to clear the reef on the outside of Saddle Island. (And he re-gained the position he lost).

 

The trip up to the mark past Cooks Landing was very tedious in 0-5 knot winds. Eventually we crossed the finish and all I can say is that we were not last. (I was browsing the web and found the race results – we came 7th in the Te Haupa Trophy division – out of <cough>9).

It was great to see the article in the Mahurangi Cruising Club Yearbook featuring me and Charlie and mentioning my first Mahurangi crewman – Rodney.

This is a fine magazine which I am sure you could purchase by following this link and contacting the club.

I am a bit depressed now but plotting my comeback….

(I saw a spare sail on the shelf in the garage and reckon if Charlie could just tweak a few things and extend the Bowsprit-of-Destiny then I could benefit from some more sail area)