Van Isle – Day 3: Who did my chores?

So, to keep things organized and running smoothly we have a list of daily chores, split across the 5 of us, on board Shearwater.  The daily chore list rotates every day, so over 5 days, everyone is responsible for all of the chores.  It’s already a running joke as we get towards the end of day, and people are reviewing the chore list for their duties to exclaim, “Okay, who did my chores?”.  We have a fantastic group, and it shows that they are always stepping up to do what needs to be done.  No fuss, and everything gets done nicely.

What a day for racing, too.  Up at 4am (but hey it was getting light out!) so that we could motor through Seymour Narrows during slack water at 5:30am.  Max ebb today was going to be 11 knots through this super narrow channel, from which an ocean of water wants to flow through, so slack water, of course, is the prudent time to pass.  Getting through Seymour that early gave us time to take a short detour over to Brown Bay to enjoy the sunrise and a plate of eggs before crossing over to Deepwater Bay for the start.

There was a bit of breeze out in the channel, but not a drop inside the start area in Deepwater Bay.  This made our strategy very clear.  Stay close, close, close to the start line and as close to channel, with the swift flowing favorable current, as possible.  That worked out swimmingly.  We ghosted across the line, the 3^rd boat closest to the channel, hit the channel with the breeze and favorable current, and we were gone.  Like seriously out of sight.  Another boat in our class mentioned that when they reached the channel we were 4 miles ahead.  The breeze was amazing too, even if it was upwind all day, and we had to tack down the narrow channel about 50 times.  Mostly 10-20 knots all day and mostly sunny.  We couldn’t have asked for better conditions for the humans, and Shearwater was very happy as well.

Long story short, only 4 boats passed us.  3 TP 52’s and Blue.  All Division 0 boats that owe us at least 100 seconds a mile.  Slightly longer version – Freja, Riva, and Jam (faster boats from Div 1) caught up to us, and then within sight of the finish, we went left, found current relief, and they all went right, and we sailed right round to the line.  So, 7^th across the line, 1^st in Div 2 and 1^st on corrected time in Div 2.  Props to 65 Red Roses (a J/111 in Div 1) – they started just ahead of us and stayed that way all day taking a big win in Div 1.  (and they are on our Team Race Rocks, so yay, team!)

Right now we are enjoying a most unusual setting.  We are literally tied to a fish farm, in a big side channel off Johnstone Strait, surrounded by snow peaked mountains.  There are salmon jumping in a pen right next to the boat, and a rotating pellet shooter is spraying food around the pen in circles, just like a you’d water crops in a “regular” farm.  Crazy and beautiful at the same time.

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