If you had tried to access the site over the last few days you may have noticed some weird stuff happening. Like the site vanishing completely. This was due to me moving hosts (and saving around $200 a year!) and buggering it up royally. Happily after a couple of days of extreme faffing around everything seems to be back to normal. Please let me know if not!
In other news I’ve decided to race in swiftshore again, but this time … on my own boat! DUN DUN DUNNNNN. This was mostly due to two factors:
- my extreme desire not to share a single porta-potty with 8 strangers EVER AGAIN
- skippers get a swiftshore baseball cap
It’ll probably be Emma and I double-handing it, and we will do one of the slightly shorter courses (I feel if we tried to do the full 140NM course we’d miss the cut-off time by literal days) but it’s still a pretty Big Deal. And I get a sweet skippers cap – did I already mention that?
Anyway, that means getting a sail number and a PHRF rating and all that junk. My sail number I got asap as my sails are being made and that meant I could jam it on while they were still in the shop. I ended up with CAN1035 (I wanted CAN69 but (un)fortunately 2 number sail numbers are very expensive and dropping a bunch of money on a shitty sex joke probably is not justifiable at this stage in my life). My PHRF rating I’ll get a bit later (it’s a handicap number basically so 4 knot shitboxes can compete with faster boats. In theory.)
I’ve also done a bunch of work on the Hebridean Wind Vane – but not all on the same piece so I can’t write about any of it. If that makes sense. More soon!
My phone finally died completely, so no more grime pics. Though I found if you order a phone from China off ebay it takes 2 months to arrive. Live and learn I guess!
Finally, this is how my boat looked after I got back from a weekend in Vancouver a couple of weeks ago (NB: Never go to Vancouver in a snowstorm. Jesus Christ. Like Mad Max but with snow instead of sand and worse driving. Also NO ONE is having a lovely day. At all.)
Of course, this all melted in the next few days and right now it is currently ~12c and sunny! WOOOOO SPRING
Surprised you didn’t have a tarp over the Gudgeon. Oh silly me, you never get snow in Vancouver. Surprise.
Swiftshure in your own boat sounds like a blast. You get to make all the decisions and get all the glory. May try to grab a ride on a boat if my schedule works out.
When are the dates?
It’s always a shock when we get snow! Even when it happens twice in one winter…
re: swiftshore, yeah, it’s a great experience! Race begins Sat May 27th and last till Sunday (or Monday morning if you are a slow boat). Not sure where you are coming from but often there are car pools etc.
There is a crew bank here http://www.swiftsure.org/crew-bank/
I got on a boat last year despite only signing up three days before the race and not really having any experience so it does work!
Those boat-in-snow pics look familiar… we were pretty shocked by the Port Angeles small boat basin freezing solid for 3 days this winter… Maybe see you out there this spring!
Sure will – I often hang around the San Juan islands as I have friends over there, so if you head that way shoot me a message! Guess you finished the refit then!?