Hamilton Island Fundraising Thank-you

The Escaped Aussies principles are Fun - Learn - Win - Give Back... in that order. Hamilton Island was tooooo much Fun - we'll blog some pictures and stories about that soon enough. We wanted to started with a HUGE thank-you to everyone that made our fundraising for Yalari a big success.

First a huge thanks to John Cowpe, National Sales Manager of Vicsail. John embraced our fundraising effort and gave us access to all the Beneteau crews at the fantastic nightly Beneteau prizes giving/drinks sessions at Hamilton. Thanks as well to Ray Marine and Wild Oats Wines for donating prizes.

We awarded three prizes at the Sunday race at Hammo - 2 for the Best Peforming Boats and a special prize to the Skipper of Holy Cow who embodies the mix of sailing and charity.

And the winner was: Pyrennes, Skipper Leanne Manley.. but a huge thanks to all the boats that donated, which by the Escaped Aussies record includes:

Tresento

Holy Cow

Kat

Makaila

Nessie Too

Europa

Real Yachting

Pyrnnes

Yes Dear

Morning Mist

Carla M

Ropabull

Tuan

Apres Vous

and of course - the Escaped Aussies on Kioni

Thanks to Helen Hopcroft for the photo and those seeking relief from the taxman - feel free to mail us at escapedaussies@gmail.com.

Press - Arrogant? Laconic? Great Read on EA...

http://www.sail-world.com/news_std.cfm?Nid=37098&SRCID=7&RequestTimeOut=180

Half way - Just a Quick One

The boys are doing exactly as expected - with respect to racing our places are

17th
14th
13th
16th

So not too flash in the racing, but then what do you expect. We have had moments of brilliance that saw the EAs at the head of the fleet but by and large we have just settled into sailing well and are dealing with handicaps, etc as usual.

The experience, so far, has been much more first place. Epic one might say. Today was Whitehaven Beach day which saw the Escaped Aussies and friends sailing back to Hamilton Island under an Escaped Aussies kite after spending a beautiful blue sky day on the beach. We've had to say good bye to Jamie Couten (Nude Nut) drawn back to Sydney on Business but other than that the comraderie, etc is, well, epic.

More news when the fun and sailing is a little less all consuming.

T-2 Lazy Planning Days in Sydney

London has arrived, San Francisco and Atlanta are here. Toronto is allegedly in Brisbane. The Sydney Siders are trying to wrap up work and it's everyone heading North. A year in the planning and it's almost upon us.

Today will see some practice on Sydney Harbor with a very very exciting spinnaker being released... stay tuned for pictures and details.

While we haven't set foot on Kioni yet, Darren & Kieran (brain trust) and Brett were eyeing another 47.7 yesterday.. my, oh my that's a big boat. Plenty of main and lots of reason to pay attention.

Tonite is the kick-off party / fund raising event at the CYC and then racing updates from Hamilton Island.

The Map

Does this not speak for itself... cool man...

Kickin' It Old School EA

This is the equivalent of the Big Bang of Escaped Aussies sailing, the "real" birth: the infamous Lady Godiva outing of 1998.

Under JK’s (James Kennedy's) leadership, the boat contested the 1998 Hayman Island Bigboat series, a regatta that used to be a pre-curser to Hamilton for seriously large and competitive yachts, which was raced at the five star Hayman Island resort in the north of the Whitsunday Islands.

Lady Godiva is a Swan 65, and in the eighties was one of the most competitive racing Swans in the world. She was on an extended Pacific cruise in the ownership of a very colourful ex Wall St lawyer and his (third) wife.

JK assembled a crew befitting the history of the boat. In the crew’s upper echelon, were two ex-Americas Cup yachtsman and the legendary Barney Walker who had just returned from the Whitbread Round the World Race (now known as the Volvo RTW). Barney drove the starts muttering words to the effect of “she’s a little slower to respond than a Whitbread 60”. At the other end of the crew spectrum (and the other end of the boat) the crew included Kieran Duck at Mid Bow, and Jamie Hastie at Bow.

Pre-regatta preparations included the removal of a large oil painting and a mountain of kid skin upholstered cushions from the saloon, a full size domestic washing machine and a cappuccino machine. However, the owner who smoked Cohiba cigars by the box, insisted that his cigar humidor remained on board.

Escaped Aussies take second

As part of the lead up to the Hamilton Island regatta, the few Australian based crew have been honing their skills in the Audi Winter Series on Sydney Harbour.

In the last race of the series, Stu, Rob and Kieran took out “Blue Moon”, Kieran’s Beneteau 40.7. The sky was threatening and the challenge of having only three crew on a 40ft boat in a building breeze was looking ominous. We were kitted out ready for the weather to turn – black beanies and wet weather jackets were the fashion statement of the day.

Everything was going smoothly until eight minutes from the start when there was a scramble to get the headsail sheets re-run, keep the boat steady in the building breeze and get back to the start line in time. We were a bit late for the start but the building and swinging breeze resulted in a single tack to the first mark. Along the way we had to avoid HMAS Parramatta and HMAS Melbourne who were parked in the harbour because most of the dock at Garden Island Naval Base was taken up by the aircraft carrier USS Kitty Hawk and its posse.

The breeze was constant around 12 knots and we started to overhaul the boats ahead, getting up into fifth position by the third mark (in a fleet of fourteen). We managed to climb to fourth by the halfway point with Rob trimming the headsail and Stu on the main.

After the fifth mark we were able to just pass in front of HMAS Melbourne without having to tack and got into second place. As we passed the next mark the breeze dropped off. Being a heavier charter boat, Blue Moon does not perform well in the light stuff. Over the next twenty minutes we were overtaken to put us back into third, and could see the rest of the fleet closing in. Some quick foredeck work saw us maintain our pace and hold onto third spot as we rounded the second last mark.

The breeze then filled back in (along with some cold, driving rain), and with a couple of well executed tacks we were back up into second spot. Coming to the last mark we were just ahead and picking our way through a fleet on port tack. As we ducked the last boat we almost didn't make the mark but we were able to use the momentum of the boat to get us around before freeing up for the run to the finish. We held off some fast finishing boats to hold our position on the last leg to finish the final race in second place.

After the cold and wet finish to the race we are really looking forward to the warmth of Hamilton – although the beers and wedges at the club went down well.

Next major outing for the Escaped Aussies – the shake down sail on the Wednesday before the regatta.