Be Reverent...
Sep. 13th, 2004 09:49 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
anigo...for you are standing in the presence of Gina, a crew member of the 2004 Convoy Cup winning boat.
Yes, my friends, it was the best of times, it was the best of times. (There was no worst.)
There were 6 other boats in our class, and 40 boats in the race. We started out at noon on Saturday. The start was a bit hairy, a spinnaker start with everybody on port except one guy who came roaring accross the starting line on starboard, with the rest of us having no where to go without creating a huge domino effect.
After that, the winds died back a bit. The average speed of the boat was 4 knots, not super fast. We left Halifax Harbour and when we got out we went way out to catch the ocean breeze. The rest of the fleet stayed inside close to shore, since it was a shorter distance. The wind died close to shore though and we, with our ocean breeze, were easily the first boat around the halfway mark. At 8:00 pm we broke up into three hour shifts. I was on the second shift so I tried to nap from 8:00 to 11:00. At about 10:30 it was all hands on deck to round the above mentioned mark. The spinnaker came down, the jib went up, the mark was rounded, and it was all done in the dark. How cool is that? (I amuse way too easily) My shift was 11:00 - 2:00. For the most part of our shifts it was just me, Shane and Carl.
We ate chocolate and were just generally silly. For example, three people were instructed to bring warm food for the trip. All three of them brought stew - two of them beef stew. It was a running joke the whole trip. "Anybody know what's for dinner? Do you think they'll have stew here?" or "Day 47. Still no sign of land. But we have lots of stew left" and "Stew, it isn't just for breakfast anymore". After lunch, the remains of one stew was poured into the pot with the next stew. The next running joke was the fact that we were having fishcakes for breakfast and if we didn't eat up all the stew Thom would mix it in with the fishcakes, which would then be mixed in with the next batch of stew. In the end we decided to rename the boat either "Stew me Loose" or "Dance with Stew"
The last winner of the cup was an old next door neighbour of mine. His boat was named Zimaz. Nobody could remember what it was called, and another running joke was the fact we called him every "z" name we could think of from Zamboni to Zits to Zippy Pin Head. We had more fun mixing up boat names. There was "Northern Dancer" and "Dog Sled" (which is bright yellow and always gets referred to as Dog P*ss) and "Broomstick". By the end of the race were calling them things like "Northern Dog Stick", and "Zamboni Broom Dancer" Things become way funny when you're working on minimal sleep. Anyway, Zorro.. or Zelda... or Zirconium, who ever they were, won last time. And they are SNOTS! The boat is rated the same as we are. As we were getting ready to leave he said "Enjoy looking at the back of my boat". I woudln't have cared if we came in dead second last, as long as we beat them.
Over night, the boats kind of split up and it was hard to see them. Zuma stayed pretty close, but kept a lead for most of the return trip. When the sun came up the only boat in sight was Zumat. Because we had such a lead at the mark we assumed we'd left them behind, but couldn't really tell. Dogsled took the mark so badly we assumed they'd missed the corse change at the skippers meeting and was going to continue on to the original mark - 50 miles away.
We rounded into the harbour, us and Zitts neck and neck, with zitts being slightly ahead a good percentage of the time. Finally, we went one way, they went another. A container ship was coming in at this time and we deeked around them to the mark. Zuma got caught in the lull, and was blocked from the mark by the boat. We ZOOOOmed ahead. When we were about an hour away from the finish line, who do we see coming at us with sails down? Dogsled. Somehow she got past us and finished WAY ahead of us. We finished with Zanzibar about 20 mintues behind us.
So, being the two lowest rated boats in this class, all the rest of the boats owed us time. But how much time!??! That was the question. Had the other boats already made it back and had left? How much time do *they* owe us? Dogsled is a 47 ft Kaufman, and upon calcuations we figured (hoped) they owed us 4 hours over the 27 hour race. Did they have us??? We beet zuppa, but we had no idea where everybody else was, so we had to wait until the presentations. Then one of the other boats came in, then another, WE BEAT THEM! And they owed us time!!
At the medal ceramony our division, being the "Premier" division went last. After what seemed like forever they got to our class. And the third place winner is......
The logic we had at this point was, if Dogsled isn't the third place boat, then we're screwed. THough second isn't so bad. My nails were bit down to the quick.
The third place winner is..... DOGSLED!!! WE WON! WE WON WE WON WE WON!!
Here we are getting our medals and trophy - there were eight of us, but by the time they got around to giving out the premier class trophy, there were only four of us still awake.
And herewe are posing for the camera. Please keep in mind that none of us look like prizes as none of us have slept more than 20 minutes in the past 27 hours, haven't brushed any hair, washed any faces, etc. It's beyond "au natural"
Gawd, sailing rocks.
On the down side - As much as I love Scopolamine - and GAWD do I ever love scopolamine, it seems to have worked on the boat but the remnants of it are now doing very odd things to my body. I feel like dog crap - all shakey and headachey.
Gonna go do some work now.
Oh wait - it's lunchtime!
Yes, my friends, it was the best of times, it was the best of times. (There was no worst.)
There were 6 other boats in our class, and 40 boats in the race. We started out at noon on Saturday. The start was a bit hairy, a spinnaker start with everybody on port except one guy who came roaring accross the starting line on starboard, with the rest of us having no where to go without creating a huge domino effect.
After that, the winds died back a bit. The average speed of the boat was 4 knots, not super fast. We left Halifax Harbour and when we got out we went way out to catch the ocean breeze. The rest of the fleet stayed inside close to shore, since it was a shorter distance. The wind died close to shore though and we, with our ocean breeze, were easily the first boat around the halfway mark. At 8:00 pm we broke up into three hour shifts. I was on the second shift so I tried to nap from 8:00 to 11:00. At about 10:30 it was all hands on deck to round the above mentioned mark. The spinnaker came down, the jib went up, the mark was rounded, and it was all done in the dark. How cool is that? (I amuse way too easily) My shift was 11:00 - 2:00. For the most part of our shifts it was just me, Shane and Carl.
We ate chocolate and were just generally silly. For example, three people were instructed to bring warm food for the trip. All three of them brought stew - two of them beef stew. It was a running joke the whole trip. "Anybody know what's for dinner? Do you think they'll have stew here?" or "Day 47. Still no sign of land. But we have lots of stew left" and "Stew, it isn't just for breakfast anymore". After lunch, the remains of one stew was poured into the pot with the next stew. The next running joke was the fact that we were having fishcakes for breakfast and if we didn't eat up all the stew Thom would mix it in with the fishcakes, which would then be mixed in with the next batch of stew. In the end we decided to rename the boat either "Stew me Loose" or "Dance with Stew"
The last winner of the cup was an old next door neighbour of mine. His boat was named Zimaz. Nobody could remember what it was called, and another running joke was the fact we called him every "z" name we could think of from Zamboni to Zits to Zippy Pin Head. We had more fun mixing up boat names. There was "Northern Dancer" and "Dog Sled" (which is bright yellow and always gets referred to as Dog P*ss) and "Broomstick". By the end of the race were calling them things like "Northern Dog Stick", and "Zamboni Broom Dancer" Things become way funny when you're working on minimal sleep. Anyway, Zorro.. or Zelda... or Zirconium, who ever they were, won last time. And they are SNOTS! The boat is rated the same as we are. As we were getting ready to leave he said "Enjoy looking at the back of my boat". I woudln't have cared if we came in dead second last, as long as we beat them.
Over night, the boats kind of split up and it was hard to see them. Zuma stayed pretty close, but kept a lead for most of the return trip. When the sun came up the only boat in sight was Zumat. Because we had such a lead at the mark we assumed we'd left them behind, but couldn't really tell. Dogsled took the mark so badly we assumed they'd missed the corse change at the skippers meeting and was going to continue on to the original mark - 50 miles away.
We rounded into the harbour, us and Zitts neck and neck, with zitts being slightly ahead a good percentage of the time. Finally, we went one way, they went another. A container ship was coming in at this time and we deeked around them to the mark. Zuma got caught in the lull, and was blocked from the mark by the boat. We ZOOOOmed ahead. When we were about an hour away from the finish line, who do we see coming at us with sails down? Dogsled. Somehow she got past us and finished WAY ahead of us. We finished with Zanzibar about 20 mintues behind us.
So, being the two lowest rated boats in this class, all the rest of the boats owed us time. But how much time!??! That was the question. Had the other boats already made it back and had left? How much time do *they* owe us? Dogsled is a 47 ft Kaufman, and upon calcuations we figured (hoped) they owed us 4 hours over the 27 hour race. Did they have us??? We beet zuppa, but we had no idea where everybody else was, so we had to wait until the presentations. Then one of the other boats came in, then another, WE BEAT THEM! And they owed us time!!
At the medal ceramony our division, being the "Premier" division went last. After what seemed like forever they got to our class. And the third place winner is......
The logic we had at this point was, if Dogsled isn't the third place boat, then we're screwed. THough second isn't so bad. My nails were bit down to the quick.
The third place winner is..... DOGSLED!!! WE WON! WE WON WE WON WE WON!!
Here we are getting our medals and trophy - there were eight of us, but by the time they got around to giving out the premier class trophy, there were only four of us still awake.
And herewe are posing for the camera. Please keep in mind that none of us look like prizes as none of us have slept more than 20 minutes in the past 27 hours, haven't brushed any hair, washed any faces, etc. It's beyond "au natural"
Gawd, sailing rocks.
On the down side - As much as I love Scopolamine - and GAWD do I ever love scopolamine, it seems to have worked on the boat but the remnants of it are now doing very odd things to my body. I feel like dog crap - all shakey and headachey.
Gonna go do some work now.
Oh wait - it's lunchtime!
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2004-09-13 09:01 am (UTC)WAHOOOOOOO!
Take that to the tackle jib sailor grunting guy place and tell 'em what for! (Or what fore... or what aft....)
Uh, YOU TELL 'EM!
Congrats!
Date: 2004-09-13 09:02 am (UTC)Congratulations on winning the race, very cool stuff. :)
no subject
Date: 2004-09-13 09:22 am (UTC)So, when are you lot going to do the round the world race ?
*evil grin*
no subject
Date: 2004-09-13 12:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-09-13 04:27 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-09-13 08:31 pm (UTC)Your description of sailing was very inspiring... makes me wish...
One day....
Congrats!!