Myora New Year 2011

 Rainbow Myora

 Zena and Zeus our "Z"-( I require a tug) code cushions purchased on a trip to the National Maritime Museum in Sydney last September.

 Sunset Myora

 Sunset Myora

 Our Christmas Lights!

 Morning at Myora

Myora Anchorage

After a very wet few weeks (Monsoonal) over Christmas we waited patiently for the weather to improve before finally setting sail for Myora (Western coast of North Stradbroke Is) on Wednesday Dec 29 2010. The day was grey with winds gusting to 36 knots from the South and at one stage I noticed we were travelling at 10.7 knots through the water. Yee Ha! We stayed at Myora for 5 days returning via a short stop at Green Is on Monday 3 January 2011. At Myora we caught up with friends Rod and Sue and family on their Lavranos 56 Etosha and Chris and Sue on their Adams 31 Noahs Ark. Lion Rampant had festive lights this year and looked very pretty after sunset. A new experience for us was a fresh water swim at Myora Springs. Delightful. We only returned to Manly because we ran out of fresh food and clothes!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to all and to all a Happy New Year!!

Brisbane has been all rain, rain, rain for ages now. We have not let this stop us from going out on the boat though. We were out a couple of weekends ago and had a range of weather from sunny at Horseshoe to storms with thunde and lightning which drove us down to Caniapa for the night and than an overcast Sunday at horseshoe where we met up with Craig and Luci fron Pabati. Last weekend we went out in company with Skimmer and aluminium Sayer yacht. A very pretty yacht with a superb open plan fitout down below. We were impressed and surprised when we discovered it was aluminium.
After boxing day we are hoping that the weather improves so that we can take off in the boat for a week. Doesn't look promising so far.

Blakesleys Cruise

At last the weather was good for a weekend cruise. Winds were from the ESE so we sailed to Blakesleys setting off early Saturday morning arriving at around 9:15AM. Blakesleys is a small sandy beach between Dunich and Canaipa on the Western shore of North Stradbroke Island. The WMYC cruising group arrived at lunch time and we joined them for a chat on the beach with sundowners later on Rob and Annette's boat 'White Star'.

The picture above is all that is left of a wrecked yacht on a sandbank adjacent to Blakesleys. The picture below shows what it looked like back in May 2010.

Back in the water tomorrow!

Lion Rampant will return to the water tomorrow. We felt quite lost not being able to use her this last weekend.

Lion Rampant Repairs!

Lion Rampant being launched with the new paint job last December.

Lion Rampant will be slipped next Tuesday for new antifoul. Should be back in the water by the following weekend.

St Helena Cup

We have just had a fantastic weekend sailing Lion Rampant in the St Helena Cup. The weather was 15 to 20 knots SE and rain for most of the weekend but this didn't deter 98 boats from competing. To anybody who dosen't sail we would be looked upon as lunatics!! We had 4 POB including Martin, Sally, Vicky and Lindsay. We were one of a team of three boats which comprised Lion Rampant, Soothsayer and Red Jam. Our team was to be called the Rampant red Oracles but ended up being Sooth the Red Lion. Our team placed second which we were very pleased with.

Combined Clubs Race August

 Sally and Martin
(Note Martin is on the helm here! How did that happen? I will have to buy a new tube of araldite!)

 Martin

 Jacq

Kate and Jacq "Love those bandannas!"

We had a great race last Sunday. The crew were Martin, Sally, Jacq, Kate and Chris who took the photos. The wind started at around 15 knots from the NE and built to about 20 to 25 knots direction varied. By the end of the race the wind was swinging westerly. We began the race without knowing what the day's course was and were unsure until we were quite close to Mud Island. The course turned out to be start to Locker light to Hope Banks around Mud Island back out to Hope Banks to the Locker Light and the finish. We had a very good start and kept going on one long tack out past hope Banks the first leg before tacking out to Mud and this seemed to be a good move. We popped the kite at the NW of Mud and held it out to Hope Banks where we had our first ever broach in Lion Rampant. This occured becuase of a number of things going slightly askew at the same time. We were about to drop the kite and were trying to hoist the genoa but it got caught on a knob on the cartridge (which it has never done before) and the cartridge came off the forestay. We had two crew to leeward ready to pull the kite in under the boom so there was not enough weight in the rail. Once the boat went into the broach I could do nothing with the helm and I had no option other than to dump the kite sheet until the trouble on the foredeck was sorted. It all worked out in the end but we did lose a bit of time. But hey it was fun and an adventure and that is what it is all about!!