This is Regatta weekend. Keyport Yacht Club hosts a series of races each June partly as their contribution to the local sailing racing organization and they've also turned it into a nice altruism effort by using the event to raise money for RAINE (a local charity aimed at helping struggling families).
I've been the official photographer for this event in the past, but schedules this week meant I could only do a day trip on Saturday. I got up early and hit the turnpike, getting to the club in time for one of the early runs.
I arrived to find a gift so to speak. Two weird eggs just sitting in the cockpit. There was no other sign of a nest, so they weren't viable eggs and either they were brought here by a predator (??) or it was a bird abortion of sorts. I hope the fish don't get too high of cholesterol levels because they accidentally rolled overboard shortly afterward once the boat started sloshing around from my movement.
I then started with a few "boat chores" - little things needed to keep up/improve Seas The Day. I wanted to start being able to easily take down the burgee as we finally replaced the flag line. I added a simple plastic cleat to the shroud to make this go a bit smoother.
We've had several split rings fall off our lifelines, so I bought a bunch and replaced two of them. Not big chores, but something to do while I'm waiting.
As I waited for John to arrive I tested the equipment with some test shots. I caught my neighbor, Joe, on Sugar picking up his mooring, and diver Dan at work in the mooring field.
Eventually the launch delivered John and we could get started.
Today we weren't sailing... just motoring around so I could get photos. John was the helmsman. I had two cameras, telephoto lenses, extenders, etc. to keep track of and didn't want to miss any photographic opportunities or shirk my skipper duties.
We motored out to find Observer (the race committee boat) and found everyone sitting in the middle of a dead calm bay. God was NOT cooperating with the sailboat race plans. While we waited a couple of boats came by for boat photos.
After about an hour we all headed back to the starting location (the whole group of us had drifted with the current) and we found wind. So the race was on!
Here are a couple of shots. A full set can be found on my SmugMug site.
After the first race, my card was almost full and my knee started aching, so we headed back.
John used the head right before we headed in and mentioned that he had trouble pumping. Once we tied up, I checked it and sure enough we can't pump it without an unusual amount of effort. We closed up and I came home to work up photos and research marine toilets. Look for a shitty blog post coming up soon!
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