The Rhumb Line #4
July 2021

It’s hard to believe that we are almost mid-way through the Summer, at least in school holiday terms. I’m thrilled to report that The Club remains busy, and I urge you all to make reservations if you are planning on making a visit for lunch, brunch or dinner. Keep one eye on Wendy’s “What’s Happening at RHADC” notes for notices of special events and dinners.

The Summer Sailing Camp is off to a roaring start, with all classes full, and from where I sit I see a large group of youngsters getting their feet wet for the first time. Our full time coaches are, as always, supplemented by recent alumni of the sailing program and I am even more pleased to say that two have filled out their Membership Application Forms. Junior sailing remains the future of both our sport and the Club.  One item to note, of which I only learned last week, is that the Department of Health are performing weekly spot-checks on all summer camps. They are interested in, amongst other things, the cleanliness of the heads/showers, group size (the ratio of coaches to sailors), COVID protocols, accessibility of first aid kits and AED’s and overall camp size. I’m delighted to state that we’ve been scoring full marks on the recent visits.

While Isaac, Kipling and Ethan have returned from their exploits in Mexico and Italy, we are sending a slightly younger group to the US Optimist National Championships in Norfolk, Virginia beginning July 26th. On behalf of our entire membership, I’d like to acknowledge the following sailors: Miguel Power, Sam Redburn, Noah Amaradasa, Rory & Jesse Savage, Pharaoh Benevides, Nina & Tadhg Gotfedson and Isaac Wickramage. For most of this group, it will be their first major overseas regatta and we wish them well.  We determined, some time ago, that an RHADC travelling team would be the best way to build skills and confidence and actually managed one trip early in 2020 before the pandemic struck. We are hoping this becomes a regular occurrence for our juniors in all classes of boat.

The RS21 “taster day” was a huge success thanks primarily to Jason Saints and Matthew Roche, but also to the sailing and dock team who launched and rigged all the boats. Such was the success, we plan on another date later in the Fall. With all of that said, these boats are available to members, if interested contact Nico, get checked-out, and let’s go racing. We are working  on highlighting some dates in September and October to offer short-course in the harbour racing – so watch this space. We also encourage those looking to dip their toe into racing, to enter some of the races in Series 3 of Wednesday Night Racing. For those a little more experienced, we encourage entering RBYC PHRF regattas, and if we can garner sufficient interest, we will place one-design fleet of RS21’s on the start line. Contact myself, VC John Nicholls or Nico for details.

On the subject of adult sailing and adult sailing instruction, we had decided to keep one of our old J24’s for some keelboat coaching. After several weeks of lessons, we’ve come to the conclusion that the RS21 is better than we had hoped for with regards to coaching and as a result we will be disposing of the J24’s. Therefore, if you want a J24, make us an offer! Two of the boats are in a “sail-able” condition, the other two are available for spares if you are a current J24 owner. Make us an offer for anything you want. All proceeds to Junior Sailing.

Elizabeth II news….on Sunday “Lizzy” had a rough start to Race 1, fouling Victory and having to perform a penalty turn. The crew rallied well, and clawed their way back to a respectable third. In Race 2, our team lead for four of the five legs of the race only to be beaten into second place by Contest at the very end. Contest romped to a comfortable win in Race 3, but with Lizzy in an equally comfortable second. Our young crew continues to develop and improve. Next race day – August 8th.

We do have a limited number of signed prints of Elizabeth II.  These were created in the early 1990’s by Paul Doughty. They are line drawings of “Lizzy”, roughly 2’ wide by 3.5’ tall and are beautifully illustrated. We are selling these at $100 each, with proceeds being directed to a new set of #3 sails for Elizabeth. I have one framed on my wall at home and it really is lovely. 

Fair winds,
Neil