Alistair Tyrrell

17 May 2015 An early start today, meeting Stuart, Georgia and Dominik at the boat at 0900. A good forecast for moderate westerly winds and we were pleased to find 6 boats getting ready to go to sea for the race.Quite a bit of sunshine and a nice bit of wind F2 to F3 from the southwest. We dropped the sprayhood into sport mode and had some really close racing with about 4 of us within shouting distance most of the way round. We fell behind slightly on the beat to the first mark but once around that we had a fine reach out to the second then a broad reach to the third and Elsa went well, we pulled ahead of a couple of them. We were around the course in 1hr 11mins and were about 4th over the line. We were preparing to sail back in when someone realised a big ship was coming out of the harbour so we had to wait off to one side until it was clear. Dominik had been on the helm for the last leg of the race so he sailed us back, we had a fine view of the fleet behind us as we

9 May 2015 Today was the club Open Day and I’d volunteered to take people out for boat rides. My friend Dani was with me and she’d brought bunting which we managed to hang over the spreaders. Sorting all that out in the wind and rain in the morning left us a bit bedraggled but by the time the event got going, the sun had come out and the enthusiasm had recovered itself. The lifeboat guys brought Blue Peter 1 over to join us which added a dash of glamour and orangeness! Blowing quite a stiff westerly we’d already decided just to go motoring up and down the river and not venture outside the harbour. David was more keen than us and took several groups out to sea in Dedicated Dancer and they all had a great time but came back wet! During the afternoon we ended up going out and back about five times with three to six people aboard each time, including some young families with small children which was great fun. Even with sails down, we were heeling in the breeze