lebleaux

I might have some bits and pieces, will have a hunt. I should have some paddle wheels as well.

Biggest disappointment for me was yet again the apparent disinterest in the event from Russell. Nothing happening on shore on Saturday morning. Not easy to get breakfast. Yet again we bugged out to Paihia on the ferry and then made our way home.

Very interesting. I have done several thousand miles in a Chico 30 called Auriga - Suva, Vila, across the Tasman and back for a Hobart race and numerous Akl-Gisborne and White Island races. At that time there was a large number of 30 foot ocean capable yachts in Auckland. A well founded Chico 30 would be about as good as you can get in that size if offshore is where you want to be ... and you can park them close to the settlement at Lord Howe island for the Friday Night Fish Fry ... if the fancy takes you.

A day in the life of Urban Cowboy Thanks for all the well wishes in the thread and yes, all are safe and the boat will live to fight another day. We started with a blast down the harbour with the fractional chute, managed to get 16.9 knots indicated for a few seconds. After turning at the bottom mark we decided to go to a second reef during which the main unzipped for the third time this year - main has had 7 years of tough use and may have had its last sail. A new one was ordered a while back and we await delivery. So we decided to sail back under jib only and finish the race. While w

I was in the vicinity as well, on board the Chico 30 Auriga. Was not much fun.

Best wishes from the Urban Cowboy crew - light it up!!!

I have a Brookhouse Mux setup on Urban Cowboy, took the NMEA feed direct from the H3000 processor - very quick and easy to do. Have also written some quick and dirty code so that my PC at home can pretend its a mux so that I can test stuff and have built a data collector so I can play with Polars. Happy to help if you go that way.

There is another aspect to this that i would like to raise - that is the role of 'crew'. The Westhaven website referes often to Berth Holders and 'their Guests'. The crew of a yacht are neither, they are Crew, part of a team without which I can not use the yacht for its intended purpose. Sometimes they take the boat out on their own, sometimes they carry out maintenance. In many respects they treat the boat as if it were their own. They are not 'guests', they are part of the team and I think that any parking restrictions must acknowledge the fact that if these people can not easily do they thi

Latest Westhaven newsletter says they have imposed a 2 hour time limit for parking in the white spaces. If you need longer then you have to go to the office and get a pass. Are they mad. How are they going to handle the volume of people on a Wednesday night who are struggling to get there in time. What happens at 7.00 qm when we have an early start so we can go race down the harbour. These guys will kill yacht racing at Westhaven if we let them.

Yep, this new security arrangement is just plain dumb. We have crew members pop down to the boat from time to time to tidy up, do maintenance or whatever ... and yes we too have to wander to and fro to let people in. There has got to be a better way.

Yep, it wouldnt work for me either. If I understand things correctly Easter always has a full moon and that makes navigation down the coast easier at night, and then there is plenty of time (3 days) to get back. November is too close to the Coastal (sometimes we dont bring the boat back until weekend following), Gold Cup, thoughts of the White Island race, all at a time when many of us are ramping up for year end. November would kill it for me.

What facilities are available at Marsden Cove. Do i need to provision the boat for the full weekend before I leave or can I buy groceries etc at Marsden Cove.

Anyone sending a car up - we have some people who need to be home early on saturday

Andy - a further response from the other recipient "Firstly Tauranga race was awesome and its amazing to have so many sponsors committing to making the event such a great time. I absolutly love my necklace and haven't taken it off since I received it in Tauranga. Perfect jewelery for a sailing girl :)" Please tell David his efforts are most appreciated.

Andy - info for David Peet from one of our lucky recipients. 'A beautiful bracelet that that I felt so lucky to have won. I have received numerous compliments when wearing it and it is still in beautiful condition after not having taken it off my wrist since the TGA prizegiving - so thank you very much for your kind sponsorship.'

I think they were pretty pleased. At least one of the items was worn all the way home. I am probably the wrong person to ask, so will seek some feedback for you. I thought the idea of having such a prize or two was a great idea.

ssssh!!!!!!

Andy, Have been having a think about what would have made the whole race experience better. Not much any of us could do about the race, it was what it was, but I think you could do some simple things that would have made life better once we arrived. We finished somewhere around 2.00pm on Friday, were tucked up on the Marina and having a snort by 3.00pm I guess and starting to party, but I was already having to think about getting home again. Plan was to bail as early as possible on Saturday and try and get back to the Mercs in daylight, but before that I needed fuel and provisions. My knowled

We recently did something similar to Urban Cowboy - moved the mast a little, decreased the rake, changed the spreader angles and converted to a cathedral configuration. The work was managed by Grant Jenkin, who I can not recommend highly enough. Grant organised the engineering (loads, lengths, calcs etc) and then did much of the work. You can contact him on 027-4931682. You are also welcome to have a look at Urban if that will help. By the way - I understand the attraction, but I would keep the runners.