Getting closer and running out of time. Over the weekend, Barb and I off loaded the liferaft to take to IMP for servicing and inspection - no small task for the two of us. For a four man raft it is quite heavy! Also, I am reaching the point where I will have to start training with the crew to get them familiar with the baot and its rigging. I figure that the month of June, one evening a week and one full day on a weekend should be good for a start, especially since both Art and Marc have already sailed with me before. I still haven't decided whether I will add the fourth crew-person to the roster. I guess that part of me is still hoping that I'll be able to persuade Barb to join us.

We have begun the refresher training for Sea Survival with a visit to HMCS Kootenay the Damage Control Scholl for the Canadian Navy, then on Friday we will go to the Seamanship School for a refresher on liferaft drills. One thing that this has particualrly given me was a whole new appreciation for what the saliors in the Navy do in their jobs. As an Army guy I had always sneered a bit at the "swabbies". They always seemed to be overweight, out of shape, undisciplined etc., particularly when compared to a soldier. However, one day in a simulation with an inclined floor, smoked filled, water and steam pouring in with zero visibility has given me a whole new respect for mys nautical bretheren. even if they never have to do it for real, the training alone is mind boggling!

05/21/2008 13:24:00

More progress! I have obtained support from Clearpoint Weather for the race participants. They will be making their package available to the racers free of charge for the month of July for those who would like to participate. The Race Committee also agreed that we could do this.

What is Clearpoint Weather? Well, if you have access to the internet from your boat this package will allow you to download an extremely sophisticated and yet very user friendly weather, environment and sea state condition report. A history of these reports and some rudimentary knowledge of weather will allow you to make some very timely personal forecasts for the weather. Since the report is based on your specific position as indicated by your GPS or as you enter into the package if you don't have your computer hooked up to the GPS, this makes it a remarkably personalized forecast.

Pretty neat, and the yachts will get to use it for free during the month of July. All they'll have to do is download the software from the Clearpoint website.

05/06/2008 13:24:00

A fair amount has happened since I started this post.

First, I have been invited to be on the race committee for RHSP. Kinda exciting since I had never done anything like this before. I feel like a bit of a fraud since I am not really a racer, but rather am a cruiser that uses this sort of event for getting to where the party is.

Of course, Barb and I have decided to retire and this race is just a month before we leave work for good. The choice was made for us so it's sort of bittersweet time in my life but I think that there will be enough going on with the boat for me to get over any nostalgia pretty quickly.

The Chain of Command has agreed to sponsor the 4 boats in the race so I have started something here which I hope should continue long after I have retired and left the area.

And I have managed to coordinate some new stuff for the race and for the race participants:

1. The Race Committee was kind enough to agree that 2+ months of training either at a military training facility of a Commercial Seamanship school will be at the very least the equivalent of the one day Survival at Sea Seminar that race participants are required to take; and

2. I have arranged with some commercial providers to get the race participants a downloadable weather service free of charge. There is still some discussion required to clear this at the race committee level, but if they can't oblige, I am comfortable that it will be for a good reason.

One of the crew may be a member of the local media who is looking for a berth to come along and make TV reports during the trip and then file stories once she is on St-Pierre.

I am planning on spending the month of May, except the long weekend from 16-18, working on installing and fixing up NELLEKE. I am very fortunate that pretty much all of the crew who have committed in coming to the race ae also the sort that actually enjoy helping with the maintenance. This has not been my universal experience in the past so you can imagine my pleased surprise with these folks. There are even two who originally said that they'd like to come, but then couldn't get away from work. Even they are still participating in the maintenance! My wife is estatic! If they weren't there I would be bugging her to come around to help me.

I plan to start the sail training on the month of June. That should give us at least three weeks of one or two evening sails per week and then one 24 hour sail on a weekend to get everyone used to the watch system that I want to use.

The 15th of July, in the middle of the race is our wedding aniversary. I'm particularly lucky to have a partner who is also interested in sailing so Barb is quite happy to fly over and join me in St-Pierre to have a celebration a couple of days late. It's our 30th so the nature of oour gift has been selected for me.

01/24/2008 13:23:38

NELLEKE has entered all of the Route Halifax St-Pierre (RHSP) races to date, less the first, and I'm kicking myself about that. For the un-initiated RHSP is a bi-annual run from the Halifax waterfront to the French Islands of St-Pierre et Miquelon off the south coast of Newfoundland, at straight line distance of about 380 nm. We won the PHRF Crusising Division in 2006.

I have been fortunate enough to have my employer give me moral and practical support to participate and I am hoping that they will do the same this year. In the past they have sponsored one boat, NELLEKE. This year we have four boats that are interested in participating and we have even created a seperate sub-category in which for us to race as well as the PHRF Division.

It's all a matter of preparation. I am fortunate in that I have three crew coming that I have sailed with in the past. For one of them, Dave, it will be the third time that he has crewed for me in an ocean race.

Since NELLEKE has been in these competitions before, a lot of the high cost items, which usually frighten off first timers, have already been purchased. Short of paying the entry fee, we should be good to go.

I will be updating this blog entry with developments as we prepare NELLEKE and her crew for the race. There will be training and preliminary buoy racing as well as social events to involve the families.