A day at the Races
Moonbeam
David and Lynn Wilkie
Sat 16 Oct 2010 09:58
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Firstly apologies for the less than frequent nature
of the blogs--- we have had complaints. It is because we are so busy but it is
quite hard to describe how and why. At the risk of copyright abuse I will paste
in a paragraph from Jack of Anthem's blog on sailblogs.com which does illustrate
the problem and proves it is not unique to us ( his blog is a good read
!)
"This fraternizing with interesting people
thing has gotten out of hand. Oh sure, it's harmless at first. You have fun and
begin to do more. Soon it's happening all the time. You can stop anytime, you
say, but don't. You catch yourself being friendly to complete strangers,
carrying on conversations for hours. Boat work suffers (your reason for
existence). You find yourself smiling for no reason at all. It's against nature,
but you finally realize you're powerless, lost and it's too late. Don't get
started. Be grumpy and irritable, don't make eye contact, expunge "please" and
"thank you" from your vocabulary. Frown at every opportunity (It requires more
muscles than smiling, so stay in shape). For heaven's sake, save yourselves. You
have been warned."
Sunday we set off early on one of Mary's Magical
Mystery Tours! An old friend (duration not age) was visiting Mary so the
wee car was full. First stop was a Farmers' Market in a small town in
central Lanzarote where we were able to buy some fruit and veg; the market is
conveniently placed next to the church and a cafe that only opens on Sunday!
Then a tour around followed by - as regular readers will guess - a very pleasant
Tapas lunch by the sea at Arrieta. Back at the marina Lynn tackled a large ice
cream and afterwards Pimms aboard "Moonbeam" before the girls headed
home
 Monday we went to Arrecife to look for some boat
bits and the rest of the day was spent making " bug screens" for 2 deck hatches.
Then an evening walk to Puerto del Carmen where Mary and Liz had
cooked us a lovely dinner.
Tuesday we were invited ( along with the " Motley
crew"- Scottish, English, Australian and Canadian yachts to join the VIP party
for a 'day at the races' So at 10.00am we turned up at the VIP enclosure,
were given passes and treated to a 'light breakfast' and a talk on the RC44
yachts then out onto the VIP vessel to watch the racing and be served drinks and
snacks all day. The yachts also race with a 'guest' on board and we were due to
get a chance of a sail but unfortunately the wind died and racing was
curtailed. " Team Commonwealth"; never looking a gift horse in the mouth;
retired to the bar where we did a sterling job of making the place look busy in
the absence of anyone else more important. Adult beverages were
consumed.
  "Team Commonwealth" aka 'The Motley
Crew'
Wednesday we once more had a supermarket dash
courtesy of Mary and we managed to load 3 trolley loads into her ( luckily hired
) Citroen C3. Thank you very much Mary. This was mainly stores
for the Atlantic crossing so the afternoon was spent putting stuff away and
making notes of what we had.
In the evening we had invited Mary and Liz for
dinner aboard Moonbeam so we also invited Aussies Ken and Wendy and English
Steve and Chris so we had tapas and paella aplenty with much
laughter.
Thursday was another go at the racing but the
organisers had learnt their lesson and we did not get full VIP passes but still
the full works during the day .
  The breeze was only about 8 knots but this time
some of us were ferried out to the yachts as they readied for the start and I
got aboard " Ceeref" .The yachts have 8 crew in total and this was an " owner
driver" race but at least 3 of the crew were professional and called the shots;
as guest I was not allowed to help sail or even talk unless spoken to! The
performance of these yachts is rather different to that of " Moonbeam "- the 44'
yachts weigh about 3.8 tons of which 2.5 ton is the keel! Of the rest the carbon
mast and rig is only 100kgs and there is a 20hp volvo diesel driving a hydraulic
retractable bow thruster as a propellor- the hull is pure carbon. In
current cruising mode I think Moonbeam is weighing about 18 tons!
The race was quite exciting with 7.2 knots to
windward in only 7.5 knots of true wind and similar speeds with asymmetric off
the wind. Mark roundings were pretty close calls and our boat was penalised for
not giving enough room in a port/starboard situation and had to do a 360.
Some of the big names from racing were there; Russel Coutts. James Spithill,
Paul Cayard and Yours Truly etc. Unfortunately as I was unable to contribute
they could only manage an 11th place however after a pep talk at the end of the
race they subsequently managed a 3rd! Back on the VIP vessel we were again
fed good food and drink!
 Wilkie in the afterguard - Owner Igor Lah at the
helm
 Wilkie leading Spithill (not for
long!)
 Friday we took a good walk and did a few boat
jobs and enjoyed the ambience of the marina which is hosting a regatta as well
as the RC44 worlds!
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