Antigua Classics Regatta

The Antigua Classics regatta is one of our favorite events of the cruising year and this will be our third year of volunteering. We love the classic boats and it's nice to be helping not just watching. It's 6 days of racing this year with round island, single handed and 4 races. There are some really stunning yachts as usual and the 30th year anniversary has drawn a lot of competitors and being based in Nelson dockyard it feels very special. However we can't help feel it's a shame the 6 J-boats between the two harbors here don't compete in the races anymore.

Well we hadn't exactly expected so much work for classics but Liz has been given 3 days work, one pre-race and then the round Island and Single handed races. It was a lot of admin and chasing skippers for paperwork as well as making sure hospitality was living up to its name and keeping drinks and snacks flowing. 

Liz working the docks

Liz heard at registration that one or two boats needed crew, so knowing our friends race and a would love to get on a boat she helped put them in touch. It ended up that Russ from Uproar and David from Sans Cles got on Iris-J and David's wife Sue got on Petrana. They all seem very excited to be able to get a ride.

Iris-J

Iris-J returning from races

Petrana at the parade of boats

Devin had an unexpected call to the single handed race for dinghy wranglers to help move boats into slips, they normally don't need us, but a lot of boats in a tight harbor lead to a call for help. 

Dinghy warnglers in action

Well that kind of set the tone for the week, Liz was asked to do a bit more and readily volunteered for a few mores days helping out. Devin being already over on the dockyard side decided to stay over to cover boats needing help or dropping out of the race early. So both we ended up with almost 10 hour days for 5 days, it felt a bit like w**k by the end.

A lot of waiting over lunch time

There were lots of events during the week in the evenings but after such long days we didn't stay to late to anything and just crashed when we got back. 

A classics start line

A loely setting for classics

Beautiful

What people come to see

The week went very quickly as we were so busy and before you know it it was prize giving. We had had a wonderful week and enjoyed every minute of it, we finally got a Braii in on the beach too. We missed our usual noodling in the mornings so we were feeling a bit lethargic and in need of some exercise. We took the offer with John and Jo to walk on the hills behind Falmouth harbor and had a nice day with Jo from Serenade and Sue from San Cles joining us too.

Wrangler buddies

Well all that racing had us juiced. Russ had approached Devin to ask if he wanted to race in Antigua race week, he decided it was time to accept as it was also a banner year and the 50th Antigua race week and should be something really special. So no more play we have a boat to get ready!

Stay tuned for part two!

St Martin - not all play

We're are still in St Martin for quite a bit longer due to ordering a new 130% Genoa and getting a few other things sorted. First though we have to put the mast back on Out of Africa, so John, Jo, Mark and Devin set about fitting the new compression post John and Mark managed to find and this leads to fiberglassing in a new cabin roof support for the mast. Devin joined in as he has never used fiberglass and wanted to learn, very interesting and informative and a lot easier than I had imagined to work with, or perhaps Mark makes it look easy? Well the post is in and the cabin roof is repaired and sanded ready to fit the mast back on. John and Jo work on getting the the mast itself ready with new wires and routine maintenance on the sheaves and other rigging points. All is set and we return to the travel lift and have the mast placed back on the boat. All goes well and we are off the dock and back at anchor the same morning, hooray!

Back over the boat

Setting it down

Letting it go

Well we had to take advantage of the duty free status of St Martin and so we had ordered a lot of new gear for Moosetracks to be shipped into Phillipsburg, so it's a day out to go get it. We did this one on our own as it was a lot of running around then out of the way to go fetch our shipment from the freight forwarder. We did a little shopping which included a few Indian and Chinese stores for some specialty items we like in cooking then in town for lunch. After lunch we walked out to pick up our shipment, it look enormous when it came out in huge packages and we both looked at each other and hoped it was all packaging. Well they allowed us to un-box it all and indeed it was mostly cardboard and packing materials and thankfully fit into our bags and was not too heavy to carry back to the bus stop. We had a new water maker pump and EPIRB battery and several other items which seemed heavy but they were not too bad. 

We then hunkered down to repairs while John and Jo painted their decks. We also managed a few more Braii or BBQ nights on the beach and a few more visits to other boats for happy hour to make sure it was not all work. Before you know it we had the email telling us our sail had shipped so we tracked it to arrival and dinghies over to pick it up. Well it thought we could carry it and John's new mainsail but boy was I wrong, John and I paid the guys to drop back the 1/4 mile walk and were glad we did. We managed to get both sails in the dinghy and back to the boats between us.

So that's the last of the fixes or so we thought. The water maker was still not doing any better and since we hand not anticipated a new membrane we did not not have one shipped in. Ouch, that was a a mistake, the US price is around $200 and locally they are well over $350 , add to that we can't wait on another shipment. We were discussing this with Dave & Mary on Wandering Rose when Dave asked what size our membrane was, I said 2540 and he looked at Mary, then said "I just replaced two this morning in my system, They were not working great but they replaced them under warranty, they might work". Dave said he would put them back in water immediately he got back and I could come try them the next day. I went out of course the next morning and brought them back to Moosetracks, it was a few hours work to fit one but it went fairly smoothly. The replacement membrane was much better but again not really low enough in salt PPM but it was well inside drinking quality. We decided it might last mother year and since we have missed our window we would take the chance until ordering duty free next year. So fingers crossed and thank you Dave and Mary.

Well all our jobs are done and we need to look for a weather window to cross to Antigua, one looks like it might just come before Classics so we wait it out. We leave on April 15 for the bridge opening intending to stop overnight in Ile Fourchue before heading on. Unfortunately while waiting at the first bridge John and Jo get an overheating problem, John thinks he can fix it but will miss the bridge. We decide to make the bridge and meet them at Ile Fourchue later. We have an easy sail down and come across Ocean Angel already on a ball and we take a free ball too.  We even arrived with a 3ft Spanish Mackerel for dinner and the freezer! A few hours later John and Jo arrive having fixed their overheating issue that seems to plague them this year.

A last trip to the Iguana

We all set off just. Before daylight for the crossing to Antigua, it is a long passage and requires a full 12 hour window for us. We make good time and arrive just before dark with John and Jo arriving just after dark. It is easy anchoring in 5 Islands so we both settle in for check in tomorrow. We are due to be at Classics tomorrow too so it up early, check in and on our way before noon, we are late for the volunteer briefing but we get caught up by our team leaders. We start work tomorrow!

So here we are back for racing in Antigua, fun times ahead we're sure. We hope everyone else has them too.