I slept in until 8:00. The forecast was for light wind in the morning, followed by gusty wind intermixed with thunderstorms in the afternoon. It turned out to be very accurate.
The Sailworks guys had told us that they would be at the Event Site early in the morning with a few demos, and would be happy to help us with our foiling.
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| Kent - eager to get out foiling! |
We had a quick breakfast and got to the site at about 9:00.
Phil Soltysaik was there with his girlfriend. He is taking part in the Gorge Cup this year and is trying to compete in, and win all the races. The races were a downwind slalom course finishing right at the Event Site point. They did seven races during the morning with a break between each. It was fun to watch. Phil easily won every race, except for the one where he fell in Jibing around the first mark - oops It seemed like each race he was a little further ahead at the finish. Very impressive.
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Phil asked me to help him with the rigging of his race sail!
I was happy to give him my expert advice..... not... |
Kent, Brad, Rene and I went out on our foils. Kent and Jim (Sailworks) chased each other around the river. I was out with my new 7.0 Flyer sail - it worked well. Brad had a new foil that he purchased yesterday and used it with his Hypersonic board. Handre tried Jim's demo, and now he may be looking to purchase a foil as well.
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| Kent on his North Pacific board and 6m Flyer. |
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| Kent is putting the rest of us to shame... |
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| Brad heading out as Phil blasts toward finish line! |
When Handre came in, I went out and tried the demo board, a "North Pacific" foil specific board. It was unbelievably light compared to my board, although it only had a 6.0 rigged on it so I wasn't able to get it foiling. I am looking forward to trying it again sometime with my rig - maybe later in the week.
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| Handre - with the Demo board and foil! |
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| Handre - ready to go! |
Blaine tried sailing on his 6.6 hucker, but couldn't really get going, so decided to go for a bike ride instead. He has a new Giant bike, which is all carbon fibre with electronic shift and a 34 sprocket on the back which gives him a very low gear ratio for hills. He calls it an Old Man's bike - built for comfort. I thought I was doing really well this year with 400km on my bike. Blaine is at 3000km so far this year, which includes 800km that he did in a week on a holiday in Mexico. He let me take it for a bit of a spin. Very nice! Somehow on his ride, he managed to avoid all the rain on his bike ride. He said that he rode on a lot of wet roads, but he was still dry at the end of his ride!
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| Blaine with his Giant! |
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| Ted - trying out the Giant! |
After foiling all morning, we stopped at about 1:30 and went to the
Sandbar Cafe, (which is right at the East end of the event site), for lunch. We sat in the sun watching all the Stand Up Paddleboard lessons in the mouth of the river.
By the time we finished lunch and walked back to our gear, it had started sprinkling. We could see some lightning in the approaching storm. It started to rain as we started to de-rig. Everything was soaking wet by the time we got everything back in the vehicles. I sat in my van reading my book for an hour or so until the sun came out again. We all came out from our shelters to see what the wind was doing. It looked pretty good. Kent re-rigged and headed out. I was thinking about it but decided to wait a few minutes. Good call - the wind suddenly died almost completely. By the time Kent made it back, it started to rain again. The wind came back up, but it also started raining harder. It was time to quit for the day. It had been a great morning.
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| Brad with his new foil |
Al and Harold spent the morning at the Hatchery and had a good sail on 6m ish sail sizes.
The call for supper was the
Taqueria Mexican Restaurant on the top of the hill. The guys all headed out while I waited for Spencer who was due to arrive on his motorcycle between 7 and 8pm. He arrived at about 7:30 right on schedule. We headed up to the Restaurant and arrived just as the others were finishing their dinner. They sat and chatted while we ate. I think they all enjoyed seeing Spencer again! Spencer insisted on buying my dinner - a Fathers Day present!
Andreas arrived just as we got back from supper, as did Ross, who had been in Portland glass blowing. They went out for supper and then joined us at one of the Condos for a beer and watch one of the world cup soccer matches. I think we are now all here. Another late evening - in bed by 11:00
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Phil crossing the finish line.
The second place sailor hadn't rounded the outside buoy. |
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| Everything was wet! |
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| Brad had a good day! |
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| Cam and Cynthia |
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Kent was going to join in the Gorge Cup race,
but didn't want to embarrass them, or himself. |
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