New Year eve
31.01.17
Nelson Pursuit Race Day
We have been looking forward to Nelson pursuit race since we arrived in Antigua and first heard about it. It sounded so much fun. The slowest boat of the fleet is sent out first bearing the French flag and the rest of the flotilla going at different time spend the day trying to catch him up. The aim is for everyone to actually pass the finishing line at the same time in theory. The crew are encouraged to dress up in period costume and there is a prize giving ceremony in Nelson’s Dockyard which doubles up a warm up for the rest of the new year’s eve activities.
When we floated the idea to Peter, he was enthusiastic although he did mention that Mr X may be a faster vessel to do it in. Not so, we knew we were carrying too much weight and besides, I was keen to drive Christine!
The rain drumming on the fore hatch woke us up in the morning. Typical, we were looking forward to a nice sunny day for a nice sail. What we got was a relentless rain for the first part of the morning. We could have been in the Solent! Still that did not dampen the enthusiasm of the crew, Ian was up and sorting out Christine’s dinghy with Peter before Lynn was up! I spent a little time gathering my costume complete with the whistle so I could pipe myself on board of Christine. By the time Jonine and Vic joined us we were ready to go. The start was in English Harbour, so we practised our manoeuvres on the way. We were on the starting line well ahead of schedule, well judged, Jonine was able to dish up wonderful pancakes and much needed coffee before the start. Milling around was a bit nerve wracking for me at the helm. Boats everywhere to be avoided. Our whistle went finally, Wanderlust had the same start time but had positioned themselves ahead of us on the line so we had someone to follow. As it turned out we did not follow them for long, we just whizzed past them in the first hour. The rest of the racing fleet soon caught up with us and it was exciting to see them go all around us. I think most of them were actually taking it seriously, as proven when rounding up buoys. We did pass a few other boats which was great. Christine was going like a train and all the tacks were perfectly judged. Skip had the crew even sitting on the rail when the rain stopped!
With the last buoy in sight, we glimpse the French flag on the boat we were pursuing. We passed them before the finishing line.
We had a great day and it was made even better when it was announced that we came 4th out of the 7 in our class. As for the best period costume there was no contest as only Lynn and myself had made the effort. We definitely earned this bottle of rum!
After a crew meal, we returned to Nelson’s Dockyard for the party, danced the night away with all our friends. Fireworks went off at the appointed hour to much cheering. The place was packed. Brilliant evening, we had a ball.