Presidents Cup Short Handed Series 2010

No pictures taken during the race but doesn't the duco look beautiful?? A bit of an 'All about me day'.

 

Berthing after the finish!

Waiting for the start

Harnessed!

Preparation before the start

Yesterday was the first of a three day series for short handed and solo sailors hosted on Moreton Bay by Wynnum Manly Yacht Club. Since last year's Presidents Cup I have felt a desire to try saling our boat alone just to prove to myself that I can do it. Also a valuable skill level for me to have should Martin ever go overboard and I have to take over. The forecast for yesterday was for 18 to 20 knots SSE so Lion Rampant was prudently set up with two reefs in the main (handkerchief size)! and the number three genoa. I kept out of the way of the big guns for the start and was soon near the back with my two reefs. They had to go! So I dropped one out and didn't notice that a knot had become jammed under a halyard on the front of the mast preventing me from hoisting the main further up. It looked bad with wrinkles so I decided I had nothing to lose by dropping out the second reef as it was only about 8 knots anyway and I felt it was unlikely to come in a whole lot stronger that afternoon. I dropped the second reef out and after a great deal of time trying to get the fat splodgy reefing lines to run by reaching out over the water to yank on them at the boom I had success. I discovered the trapped knot on the mast when I went forward to deal with the reef lines. With the main now all the way up speed was a little better but we were now so far behind that it was a miracle that we managed to catch and pass anybody. Second folly of the day was that I had elected to sail the series with 'no spinnaker'. I am hoping I can some how rectify this for the next race as I was the only boat with no spinnaker and it was frustrating. But I feel a great sense of achievement for having sailed the boat alone from Manly around Peel Island and back. It was a magnificent day. Can't wait for the next race! Martin sailed with Lindsay Granger in the short handed (maximin two people) on Lindsay's boat "Transition" a Young Galaxy 8.5 and they did very well finishing 2nd line honors!

Perulpa Bay

'Intrigue' at anchor

Roast Pork

The Cobb Barbeque (a recent boat acquisition) was used to cook roast pork and roast chicken! Food seems to be an important part of our boating.

Perulpa Bay is a great anchorage in a Winter westerly!
Had another great weekend cruising around Moreton Bay.

Star Olympic Training

Came across this HD video on another blog. Great when viewed full screen!

Sailor Profile - Andy Horton from Amory Ross on Vimeo.

Jessica Watson Welcome Home

Day 3 - The next day we sailed Lion Rampant back down the coast to Manly in 20 to 25 knot SW winds. This trip took 12 hours as we were beating into it most of the way. The crew for this trip was Sally, Martin and Jacqui Valk. It was freezing cold even with mutiple layers under wet weather gear so I will be buying some thermals before next weekend!! Jacqui seems to love extremely windy sailing and had me laughing till I cried at one stage.

Ella's Pink Lady outside Mooloolaba Yacht Club

Indigenous welcome!

Lady Margaret

Ella's Pink Lady coming into the Marina

Ella's Pink Lady surrounded by the welcoming flotilla!

Jacqui Valk

Trevor Hill on his boat Apriori in which he recently completed the Solo Trans Tasman Race placing first monohull. With Trevor are Jen Wilks and Chris Spurgeon.

Martin showing his pink bits! All crews and welcoming crowds made a huge effort to wear something pink to welcome Jessica.

Jessica's secret rig?

Police escort! I have only ever been offered one of these twice when pulled over for misdemeanours!!

Kate Greenwood

Jessica and Ella's Pink Lady sailing up the coast from Caloundra.

Day 2 - On the Sunday Jessica was due to arrive in her yacht Ella's Pink Lady at around 12:30 so we set off at around 9am to sail down the coast towards Caloundra to meet her. The wind was SW at around 20 to 30 knots. We joined a large flotilla of around 50 boats to sail with Jessica up the coast. She was also accompanied by police boats and helicopters. Large groups of people lined the shore to see her sail past. It was a stunning spectacle to see all the boats zipping around Jessica's yacht. Our crew for this day was Sally and Martin plus Kate Greenwood, Lady Margaret and Jacqui Valk.

Lady Margaret, Chris Spurgeon and Kate Greenwood.

Glasshouse Mountains between Bribie and Caloundra!

Kate's extraordinary Duck salad and necessary accompaniments!
Photo Chris Spurgeon

Sally, Lady Margaret and Martin.
Photo Chris Spurgeon

Early morning departure from the marina at Manly for the sail up to Mooloolaba on the first day. Photo Chris Spurgeon

Lion Rampant and her crew have just had a wonderful weekend. Friday evening we stayed on the boat in the marina so that we could set off at first light to sail up from Bisbane to Mooloolaba. We had NW to SW winds of 10 to 20 knots which made it a fabulous spinnaker ride for a lot of the way up the coast. The trip took us 9 hours. Our crew for the trip up to Mooloolaba were Sally, Martin, Margaret (Lady Margaret), Kate Greenwood and Chris Spurgeon.

Canaipa Cup

Sally and Martin

Sail trim after the start!

Sunset Canaipa

Chris relaxing!

Under sail in the Sunday race back to Manly (photos by Neil Planck)



Hull reflections!

Sunrise Sunday Morning

Cheese and champagne for our motor to Canaipa on Saturday


Pan fried Salmon for dinner!

Shipwreck off Blakesley's (We don't know the story here but presume that the skipper of this boat didn't know which side of the beacons to stay on to avoid the sand banks or else he was swept up on the banks in bad weather. ) This boat has been there for a few months now!


Towing a bunch of Blazer sailors on "Shrek" down to Canaipa after the race abandonment. It would have emptied their fuel tank (and their Esky) since they only had an outboard!

Chris our foredeck whiz!

Lion Rampant!

We just had a fabulous sail in this years Canaipa Cup. This is an annual event organised by RQYS for the combined clubs of RQYS, WMYC and MBTBC. I (Sally) elected to be skipper for this event. I was a little freaked out at the start as starts in a yacht are far more risky financially than dinghy prangs! We ended up at the business end of the start line right next to the start boat. A Hick 42 Ceilidh Lass was attempting to barge through between us and the start boat and a Beneteau First 40.7 Blunderbuss was below us pushing up. We are only just under 30ft so it is a little intimidating to be yelling for water at the skippers of these boats. We all broke free in the end without touching and even Ceilidh Lass made it through! The wind during the race got lighter and lighter and eventually some boats were floating backwards on a glassy sea. The race officials abandoned the race and we all motored down to Canaipa for the BBQ etc at Browns on Macleay Island. Next morning was light and we all motored across to the start at the tip of Macleay Island. An easier downwind spinnaker start this time saw us right up with some bigger boats such as Medina, Its Natural, etc at the first mark. We lost some ground on the next leg and then regained heaps on the leg following with our big white masthead kite! Sailing only three up (Martin, Chris and myself) I think we did quite well with a 5th on handicap in the combined clubs results.

Mothers Day 2010

We took my parents and daughter Rachel out on Lion Rampant yesterday for Mothers Day. It was a perfect sailing day with SE winds of about 15 to 20 knots. We sailied around Green and St Helena Islands in Moreton bay and then anchored for lunch behind the Jetty on St Helena.

Lion Rampant's Story

The Lion Rampant Crest on our stern!


Lion Rampant at Peel Island


Lion Rampant the day she was launched with the new paint job!

Funatic before the repaint and rename "LION RAMPANT"

Lady Skippers Race 2009

INTRODUCTION

Lion Rampant is a Young 88 yacht designed by New Zealander Jim Young and built in 1983. Her first owner named her Funatic but after owning her for three years we have just changed her name to Lion Rampant. My husband Martin is Scottish by birth and used to sail a laser he called Lion Rampant. The Lion Rampant is the Royal Standard of Scotland (a Scottish battle flag).

Martin and I race and cruise Lion Rampant around Moreton Bay in Queensland Australia.

THE DAY WE BOUGHT FUNATIC!!

Martin and I had considered many boat designs before we purchased the Young 88 "Funatic". Apart from Young 88's we also looked for a Ross 930 but could not find one. Our goal was to find a reasonably fast but comfortable cruiser/racer! At the time we were looking there were two Young 88's for sale in Brisbane. We looked at a boat called "War Canoe" first but it was not the boat for us so we went to look at the second boat. For both of us it was love at first sight! We sat and talked with the owners for a couple of hours. It was weeks later (agonising) that we finally made an offer. The day we motored the boat to our berth I felt as if we were stealing the boat. It was just so hard to believe that it was finally ours!

Since that day we have done much cruising and racing in our boat.