2014-04-26

The volunteers on the committee boat were to meet at 09:30 in the morning in order to prepare the boat for the races, which meant that Stephen and I were topsides to remove the lazyjacks and to make the sail on the boom as compact as possible so as not to get in the way of the flags. We then put the flags on the poles (liberally using our big roll of duct tape) and checked the sound system for proper functioning. This took a bit longer to actually do than it took me to write, so it was after noon by the time we completed the tasks. I then joined the crew doing the finishes of the day’s “Around The Island Race” up on the lookout over the Pillars of Hercules outside of English Harbour and the fastest boat, the ICAP Leopard, came in over an hour in front the next competitor and the 40 odd boats came in during the course of the next couple of hours and we didn’t close up shop and take down the finish line until 18:30 (which coincided with the beginning of the prize ceremonies). So we ended up having a drink or two at the clubhouse and then a group of us went to a pizza joint for a wonderful and tasty oven-fired pizza dinner and by the time I returned to the boat, somewhat wobbly at the knees from Kubuli beer, it was close to 11PM.