What a cracking Regatta!
You can,t judge the success of everything by paper results, which is just as well. We got up early, organised ourselves, had breakfast and a good (no, leave that out Ed), made sure all the gear was ready, arrived at the start on time, concentrated hard on what we were doing, trimmed the sails, steered the course, and did everything else possible to make Cleone go as fast as she could, but since we could do nothing about removing the ton of water and half a ton of fuel which we needed for the next part of our trip, let alone shave and deepen her four and a half ton keel, all was of no avail. As she always does, Cleone made her way safely and steadily around the poorly defined buoys of the various courses, but failed to make much headway, even on corrected time, in the placings! But, starting in Raiatea on the first day, and circumnavigating Tahaa by the end of the second, and crossing to Bora Bora on the third, we finished the Regatta with a wonderful morning on Strega (a First 47.7) and Andreas Steffan, learning how a real racing yacht should be managed. We saw wonderful scenery, partied hard in the evenings at various Yacht Clubs and restaurants in magnificent tropical settings and enjoyed watching the other yachts as they scythed or struggled past us, crewed by a mixture of dedicated experts and others just out to enjoy the moment and the exhilaration of competitive sailing. There was a plethora of "local" yachts, almost exclusively sailed by expatriate Frenchmen, a family catamaran with two very small children aboard, several hired yachts from Moorings or Sunsail, with a mixture of French, Italian and British crews, and many of our own World ARC boats. These included the magnificent Far Out, the swift Wizard and Branec, and many others of our friends - Strega, Blue Flyer, Kasuje, Into the Blue, Talulah Ruby, Asloare, JusDoIt (we are only here for the parties), Southern Princess, Storyteller and Chantelle. But all were scantily crewed and heavily laden and none were able to show their proper potential. But the other crews and our hosts in Raiatea, Tahaa and Bora Bora were clearly delighted to see us, and goodness me, did we enjoy ourselves! And to ring the changes a bit, Ruby from Kasuje joined us for the Bora Bora race. This allowed Norfy to escape to the comforts of Kasuje, whilst giving Ruby a chance to help with the hard work of keeping Cleone on the move. Hopefully, both enjoyed the change - for us it was great to have Ruby on board, and Norfy raved about the ease and excellent service whilst traveling aboard Kasuje.
So here we are in Bora Bora, now scratching our heads whilst we try to recover some sleep in order to work out what we will do between now and the formal departure from Bora Bora on the 18th of May. I will keep you posted on developments. Meanwhile, the crew are ashore in Bora Bora Yacht Club (no doubt sipping cups of tea) and I must have a shower and get ready for one of Steve's famous curries on board Kasuje.
All well and happy, but tired and slightly sunburnt, even after all this time in the tropics.
James, Chris, Elizabeth and Will
Yacht Cleone
Bora Bora
Society Islands