Photo selection: Samui '11

Digger's shoes match the spinnaker clew and the other spinnaker...

I see that Cess is sending out CD to all crew and thanks for that, Cess!
Meantime, I've made a bit of selection, 10 or 20 in each of two sections...

People selection

Boat selection

Xena back on her moorings

Xena back at Royal Hong Kong Yacht Club, at pontoon,  21:45 on 19th June.
I went to see her Monday 20th and she's in great shape!  (apart from the genset of course...)
The big ugly brown thing is an air vent for the MTR subway

Xena back on her moorings just before 10:00 pm last night, so just under 8.5 days return from Koh Samui.
Congrats to Grant and the boyz for another successful delivery!
I'm off now to see about the "to do" list....

From Grant, last nite:

Dear Peter and Jing,

Happy to report your lovely "Xena" is tied up to the RHKYC jetty safe and sound.

Easy for the boyz to off load and hose down here.

Also fairway not dredged yet so only safe to go to mooring when tide high.

Have spoken to Simon and he and Benny from "Moon Blue 2" will give the boyz a hand put "Xena" on mooring when they are ready tomorrow.

Now a bit of a clean up, then some sleep and off to immigration and port authorities first thing.

Followed by amendment of flight home to tomorrow arvo hopefully.

Thanks again for everything, enjoyed our time togeather.

Talk again soon when I am home.

All the best, Grant.

From Iris, this morning:

Good Morning Peter and Jing

"Xena" safely Home.

Grant will miss the Boyz and they likewise .. another delivery well done.

I forwarded a copy of U.K. Halsey Newsletter to forsythe1@netvigator.com

interesting reading about Lightning .. Fuel Filters .. Clogged Air filters and Injectors.

Thank you Both kindly making Samui Regatta possible for us all .. pleasure to be with you.

Must say how impressive "Xena" looked .. all decked out for Cruising .. Thanx to the Boyz .. they're Great!

...
Lotsa Love

S P L A S H !!!!!!

Xena approaches Hong Kong

As of 08:00 HKT, Xena was at 20.50n 113.35e, about 100 nM from Hong Kong, scooting along at 8 SOG, on broad reach, SSE breezes around 15 knots.
Same breezes as we had yesterday in the DB Regatta, where I went on Tom W's Vega, and we came second in Div A, to Boadicea.  Lovely day, clear skies, steady breezes.
I'm estimating Xena's arrival Hong Kong around midnight tonight.
Samui piccies just for fun...(as always, click to enlarge)

"China hires Volvo Ocean winner to skipper entry"

I thought I'd follow China's entry in the America's Cup World Series, for a while anyway.
Article in today's South China Morning Post below the fold.

"China joins America's Cup Series"

From today's South China Morning Post, news that China will be in Portugal in August for the opening race in the America's Cup World Series.
This is good for sailing in Hong Kong and Asia.  And ties in with what we're trying to do, to bring more youth sail training in Hong Kong (w.i.p.) and co-organise more events with China.
Article copied below the fold:

Grant and the Boyz get great view of last night's eclipse

Longest this decade, turned blood red by volcano

From Grant, this morning, by onboard email:

Did you see the full moon last night ? 

We were just off Nha Trang, clear sky.........like daylight.  Then about 2 am it slowly got darker and darker until moon eclipsed.  Full moon back around 4.30am. awesome !!

BTW: they've been hiking along at 8-8.5 SOG, with 20 knots on the beam

Oh what a glorious day

Xena in centre, Race 6, S. Islands course, leading the fleet.  Click to enlarge.
Photo: Anne-Sophie, Samuipics.com

This is a stunning photo.  Clear day, lovely breezes 15-18 knots.  Koh Samui so clear in the background under perfect tropical clouds.
The Island course took us south past the reef and bottom mark, back through a gate to the finish.  We led start to finish on the water and took a 5th on corrected time, when the storm -- about 20 minutes after this photo -- overtook the backmarkers and brought them to finish with 35+ knots of breeze.
Click once to enlarge and click again to enlarge even further.  Thanks to Anne-Sophie for this lovely photo!

Another nice one, the A2 in full flight, finishing the W/L course, Race Five.
Baby Tonga is the kite with big circle on it.  Bit too close....

Russell Coutts pitchpoles in 22 knots yesterday

We didn't see this from the Multihulls at Samui! [hat-tip to Joachim]

Xena leaves Samui, on her way home

Desperate to improve our IRC handicap, we made a few modifications to

Xena before departure..... (re the handicap, don't get me started)

Xena left Samui yesterday after lunch yesterday with Grant, Noel and Mike aboard.

Grant says:
Final checks completed, dinghy and motor stowed.  Rest of the boat stowed for offshore. Departed Samui after lunch today [11 June].  Big rain storm at present, expect will only last about 1 hour. Wind from behind. All rest OK.
God willing see you in about 9 days.

Cheers, Grant

Some photos from Cess. "TongZena Cup"

Twice Aussie IRC Champion, Peter Sorenson ("Soro") of Baby Tonga presents inaugural

"TongZena Cup" to Peter of Xena.  The Cup will be fought for again at King's Cup, in December.
(it was a dark and stormy night. Oh... and wet and humid..)

From Cess:

Hope you both had a great time cruising & exploring.  We, too stayed on for another 3 days at another resort in Lamai (infact close to our upwind mark when doing south course) to rest and relax.  The week's racing must have caught up.......we were in bed at 7pm on Sun! Attached a stunning photo of you both  & 2 others from SamuiPics.....

Peter and Jing at Skippers' VIP reception, 31 May

The crew in "dress shirts", Farewell Party, 4th June

Richard (kneeling), Michael, Cess, Judy, Iris,

Tony, Jing, Peter, Digger, Grant,

Stevo, Catherine, TC (Ben), Cam

....

Joyce, who was on the press boat &  also on Ffreefire, has more Xena photos which she will pass on to me today. Will put them all together onto DVD and hopefully  post them to you before I fly out this weekend. [PF: so... come back again.  I'll post them when received]

Keep well in the meantime.

Cheerio,

Cess

Koh Samui Day Five. Party and "TongZena" Cup

View to Chaweng Cove, from Centara, early morning, 4th June

Noel, MC, Iris, Jing, Digger, TC, Stevo, Peter, Cess, Richard, Tony
Grant, Judy, Cam, Cookie

Just a quick note from my iPad, as the hotel wifi is not working and I can't post photos, to say:

A. Some more photos -- I'll post when I get Internet access, which won't be till Thursday, so come back then to check them out.

B. Pete Sorenson, skipper of "Baby Tonga", instigated the "TongZena Cup" (mis-spelling of both names one of those local Thai "lost in translation" moments), which he presented to us on stage at the Prize giving last night. A gracious and thoughtful gesture. He told us "don't hang on to it too tight, we're coming to take it back at King's Cup!".
Photos of the Cup and party on Thursday, if not before.
Cheers to all crew and safe journeys home!
Update, 9 May, the "TongZena Cup"

Presented to Xena by Peter Sorenson, on 5th June at Samui.
Winner 2010: Baby Tonga. Winner 2011: Xena
To be fought for again at King's Cup 2011

Update, 8 May, some photos:

Xena upwind Race 9

Koh Samui Day Five. Zig, Zag, Zoot, but a Tonga in the boot.

Well, the best news of the day was that we held off Baby Tonga... just!  Entering the last race, Race Ten, four points ahead of them, we lost all those four points as they finished four places ahead of us.  Equal on points, they count back to determine the winner and we pipped them by one place.  So: they beat us at King's Cup on count-back and we beat them in Samui on count-back.  Some symmetry there.

Tactician Cookie, looks for breezes.

Otherwise, our last race day was not covered in glory.  The Race Officer, Ross Chisholm, set us off on Course 9, an islands course to the south around the reef and back north. There was a bit of argy-bargy at the start, we were caught boat end, when we wanted to be leeward near the pin, were OCS, ducked back and came out mid fleet.  It was downhill from there as the winds died from 13knots at the off to 3-4 knots at the bottom mark.
We zigged when we should have zagged, hoped for shifts didn't happen and we finished mid fleet, down the list on corrected.
We were worried Tonga may have pipped us; so, apart from the ordinary race, the day finished well when we saw results of our pipping them on countback.

Koh Samui Day Four. A long day at the office

I don't have the results yet, just off to the Tavern to see them, so this is day four short version. Very, very short version: [update at bottom]

Leading the fleet in Race Seven, Day four

Race Seven: windward-leeward, twice round. Wind 10-15 knots.  We led at every mark and at the finish, raced well, but lost wind on the final run to the line, with others coming on building breeze -- how often has that happened!... So we can't have been good on handicap, as the followers were a following a touch too closely.  Baby Tonga beat us (corrected).  Update below.
Race Eight: windward-leeward, twice round.  Breeze 8-9 knots.  We raced a shocker, going out left looking for breeze, finding it too late, and right turned out favoured, with two completely different breeze lines on the course and we finished mid-field on the water, an unusual place for us to be. Baby Tonga beat us (corrected).  Update below.

Cam pings the start

Race Nine: windward-leeward, twice round.  Breeze 4-5 knots.  You can tell from the so-called "breeze" that this was a dodgy race to even start, to say the least, and there were mutterings....  We drifted round in shifting light winds, up and down, back and forth, but some canny tactics brought us second over the line, with some possibility of an ok result.  We beat Baby Tonga (corrected)
That's it for now.  More later, maybe. [Update below]

Sailing in 3-4 knots of alleged "breeze", Race Nine

Update: 5th Race Seven, 10th in the shocker of Race Eight, and 6th in Race Nine.  Beat Baby Tonga in Race Nine by 4 places, for a net lead overall of 4, which is what we go into tomorrow with.
We're lying equal 7th on points with Katsu, and have a chance to move a few places up tomorrow if the breeze is decent (all we need is a touch above 10 knots and we're happy -- we don't ask for much....) and we'd prefer to do an Islands course, if breeze enough.  The best we can hope for is to move to fifth.  Meantime, we have to hold off any challenge from Tonga, our nemesis in King's Cup (equal first on points, second on count-back).

Day Four. Lay day and Library Party

"Take that, IRC!"  Cess' view of our rating.  But don't get me started...

More photos below the fold

Day Three update... and "Splash"!

The lady that took this shot also caught our bottom mark MOB practice.  See below.....
Xena heads south on Islands course nine.

As promised in last post, herewith update:

Race Four: windward leeward, twice round.  10-15knots.  We led the fleet from the good start at pin end, leeward.  We had good speed on all, and led at first two marks, and a third mark, windward, we went round on the heels of One More Prang, the GP42 which rates higher than us (for NSRs*: that means the handicapper thinks they are faster, hence have a higher handicap). Then on the run home did well again on the fleet, tactician Cookie getting well placed and covering well all way down, second over line and a Third on Corrected time. 

Wooshka.

Race Five: windward-leeward, once round.  We led all way round, to finish over line first, by two seconds.  Passably well on handicap, with a sixth. Update (08:00 am): the detailed results were not online as of posting this, but talking to committee boat people just now, (rest day, breakfasting at Centara Grand), they said that there were just three seconds between us and third place on corrected time.  It's our new handicap, see, but don't get me started on that!)

Heading to start, Race three

Race Six: Passage race, course 9, 10-15knots, gusting 18k: down south, port passing mark half way down, round bottom mark, through gate by the reef and home.  We led from the get-go and put distance on the fleet all the way on first beat, which became a tight reach to the bottom mark, boat going well, 8-9knots in 12+ knots of breeze.

Round the bottom mark, gybe-set to A2 spinnaker, beautiful rounding well in front of fleet, kite half way hoisted before the mark, smooth rounding, gybe, set, banded kite pops and flick!  Iris overboard! 

Quick action by crew boss Stevo, and she was hauled back on board, shaken but unbowed.  She’d held on to the sheet saying to herself “we’re racing, we’re racing”, so held on tight and kicked her legs to get a surfing motion going.  Amazing was how quick it was, in an instant she went from on board heading to cockpit to trim, to being overboard.  

Hoist A2, drop Jib, smooth going till...

Splash!... Iris takes a dip... flicked off deck by spinnaker sheet....

... but hangs on ("we're racing, we're racing", she's thinking) and is hauled aboard.

Lessons learned we’ll discuss at tomorrow's briefing....  And, once settled, we made for the gate, under very shy A2 kite (NSRs*: an asymmetrical spinnaker, for medium airs) to lay the starboard passing mark of the gate, running 120-30 True, 85-90 Apparent wind angles, doing 9-10 knots.

All fine till near the line, we well in front, and squall brewing behind us.  We kept our kite up till the last moment, about ten lengths from the finish line, when we spiked the kite, and ran home with 30+knots under main to the finish, and easy Line Honours.  The rest of the fleet was well behind us, us and got hammered in various ways, some broaches, some panicked dropping of kite and heading upwind.  But the good boats all got their spinnakers down and ran home with gusts over 40knots, running fast to the finish, which did it for us on handicap and we took another sixth.

Not a bad day’s work, and with Iris safely on board, we can say it was a memorable and thoroughly enjoyable three races, in the classic of tropical racing, clear skies, flat seas and good and steady(ish) breezes.

Baby Tonga update: "Tonga" is the other boat in the division that is really a Premier Class boat, not IRC 1, same as us. We raced together in King's Cup last December ending equal first on points, with them taking first on count-back. We were keen to take them on again here in Samui, but Premier Class dissolved with some drop-outs, so we race them internally in this IRC 1 Division, not really appropriate for either of us.  
End of Tuesday, they were one point in front of us. In the three races yesterday, we beat them twice by two points, and they beat us once by one point, for a net gain to us of three point on the day, to take us two points in front of them with two days to go.

*"NSR" = Non Sailing Readers

Koh Samui Day Three. Three races and a great day on the water.

Three races today, two windward-leeward one island course.  We picked up a third in the first race, which was pleasantly surprising.  And one, maybe two, line honours (don't know yet -- it was an "on the water" squeaker), just off to the Tavern for prize giving and results).  Some dramatic events on the water, about which more later.  For now, just saying that we had a great day's sailing, a great change from yesterday's squib.
Photos below (thanks again Cess).

Grant asked if North Sails could do a little bimini for the back.
Instant service from Stevo

More photos below the fold

Dingle update

Hong Kong from Lei Yue Mun, last year (nothing to do with post below....)

There was a bit of a dingle at the start of the race yesterday, involving a collision at the pin end between front runner Matt Allen's Ichi Ban, the local GP42, and top-rated boat Wan Ma Rang and Baby Tonga.  WMR hit both the other boats, was judged at fault and disqualified.  Ichi Ban was hit and spinnaker pole bent, so they had to retire and seek redress; which they got -- they will be awarded an extra place at the end of Friday's racing equal to the average of its places to that day's racing.  Tonga had damaged stanchion, but was otherwise unaffected by the event.
One other result: Wan Ma Rang, promptly rechristened "One More Prang".

Baby Tonga update: had chat with Pete Sorensen, skipper of Tonga last night's skipper's reception.  He's keeping close eye on us as well, as the only other Premier class boat in the fleet, and given our close competition in King's Cup.  They finished three places up on us yesterday, against the two points we made on them in Day one, giving them one points lead on us overall so far....
Pete said he liked Xena.... so we invited him to join us for a regatta closer to home -- Boracay in the Philippines maybe, in February.  Chatted with Ross Dawson of Ffree Fire, who's crewed with us on Xena from time to time, and he says Borocay is a great regatta, with steady strong breezes in the 20+ knot range, dependable.  It's in February, winter there, no need for air-con.

Met the lady that takes photos for the Regatta, who directed us to the Regatta website where there are plenty of photos, too many maybe....