Jindabyne 2020

The year 2020 just about sums it up for those who went to Jindabyne last weekend for the Snowy Mountains Regatta.

I missed Fridays invitation race as I was driving down from Sydney. Saturday morning was a typical Jindabyne start, light and variable with patches of nothing. Knowing however that the breeze was on the way, we swung in to action, just John and  I on the start boat.  The wind settling in from 270 at around 10-12knots.

Going in to sequence, John clipped on the Taipan warning flag and it was up at  1055, a minute or so later it was gone. A short AP and a change to Code T and we were back in sequence again. Then the breeze really filled in and the anchor on the start boat wasn’t holding. Rather than have  the fleet of 70 sailing around whilst we waited for more chain, I sent them ashore. After another short AP, we were all set to go again, letting the shore team know to drop the AP ashore and send them all back out again. However the breeze was still on the increase, so as only a few turned up we called it a day mid afternoon.

The forecast was for it to increase significantly and the warnings went out to all competitors to unrig and tie down their boats. As the Sun went down it really hit with rain as well helping to drop the air temperature, I was just happy not to be out there in it.

Overnight it hit even harder and those arriving at the club  on Sunday morning were ‘greeted’ with trees down and boats all over the place. The Taipans and Vipers especially took the brunt of the blow.   Sunday morning on the beach was a sad sight of competitors packing up what was left. Those who escaped also packing up and heading home. Thanks go however to those who made the effort to come all the way from South Australia and Victoria for what would have been their only regatta this season.

As the breeze started to drop as forecast, there was still a handful of locals who wanted to sail, everyone else were packing up, shaken by the overnight weather and the resulting damage.  It was then decided to do an Island course for the 5 monohulls and 5 multihulls rigged and ready.

As I was no longer required, I too decided to head home early to escape the  afternoon traffic retuning to the city.

My thanks again go to the locals and their support of the event was fantastic, there was plenty of  personnel and rescue boats to go around, even a mark boat for each course mark.  I’d also on behalf of DeckHardware and LJSC like to thank Barton Marine UK for their support with a donation of vouchers for  Barton product. 

I just hope that like many, we can drop 2020 out  of our lives and return to  regattas like Jindabyne afresh in the future.