Mixers
08 March 2019
Stuart Letton
When I were a lad, every year our pal Henry would load up a bunch of us on his boat, Smarty Pants, to join the week long Scottish Series on the west coast of Scotland. For the twenty years we did the Series we had a core nucleus of crew members, me, Henry and Jane, the others being added as we could press gang them. With over two hundred boats racing, from Sonatas to Admiral's Cup flying machines, all needing on average perhaps seven crew, getting experienced hands was tough, and that's where our core, long service award "afterguard" came in useful. The three of us made it every series for these twenty years but each year we still had to find the extra hands. Jane was in charge of the press gang and each year, in the marina before the off, I'd ask who we'd managed to get. "Well" Jane would typically respond, "we've got Neil. He's a great folk singer and guitarist. John, he plays fiddle and then Martin, he's on bodhran. We didn't win many prizes but we could play great tunes.
The thing is, each year we quickly formed as a crew. A tight knit bunch who sailed together, ate together and thrashed around the ceilidhs like demented idjits together. We were, like all the other crews, socially independent. Of course, we'd stop and say Hi and chat to old and new friends but, in the end, we and all the other crews would be in our own huddle, doing our own "thing".
When boats have enough crew to be socially independent, they simply don't need a couple of strangers turning up and changing their team dynamic.
Seemingly unable to break into the social circles of the rally and feeling like Billy No Mates, or perhaps we've lost our mojo, we were ecstatic to see Gradiva pop up on the AIS a week ago. We first met Scott and Rachel in Vanuatu a year or two ago and stayed in touch as they are Tasmanian and have cruised both the east coast of Australia and most of Tasmania extensively. Scott has been my "virtual" pilot book as we've cruised around here the last two years. And he makes great home brews. They are sitting with us in Birchs Inlet and also waiting on the weather. They want to get north. We want to get south and it's rubbish for both of us, such is west coast Tassie weather. Maybe Sunday.