Fairwinds

[Silkie]

Saw the bold voyagers away yesterday lunchtime.

I'd planned to sail with them for a bit but conditions were just too good for them. A beautiful hour running downwind in F4 would probably have required 4 hours tacking back into F4/5 and 1.5 knots of foul tide. So I bobbed around outside Balvicar Bay instead and took pictures as they cruised serenely past with just the new genoa up.

Bon Voyage!

[Nick]

How about posting a piccy of our departure here so we can see it?

- Nick

[claymore]

So you fancy the sight of your collective backsides and transom disappearing into the wide blue yonder do you?

[Silkie]

Believed taken from a pontoon on Seil island on or about Wednesday 2nd August 2006, the "sailors" are wanted for questioning in connection with an on-going investigation into the disappearance of a quantity of snurble grip-thribleys.











How long before someone says she's down by the stern or asks where their ensign is?
(Full-size images available on request)

[Aja]

Seems a tad down by the stern, don't you think?

Donald

[ash]

Seems a tad down by the stern

At least the cockpit drains are still above the waterline - I thought that she might have been lower. The water will be well up the length of the cockpit when she's heeled - hope Nick has a decent seal on the access panel in the cockpit sole.

Thanks for the photos, Silkie.

Ash

PS - Just had a look at a blown up image in photoshop - even at the slight heel - one of the drains is under water - she is low - Nick and Cathy will come back with webbed toes.

[ash]

Glad to see that Nick and Cathy have a doctor on board.

Steve Birch might have donated a Vega Burgee to the cause.

Ash

[Silkie]

Seems a tad down by the stern, don't you think?

99 minutes.

You and I in a little toy shop
buy a bag of balloons with the money we've got
Set them free at the break of dawn
'Til one by one, they were gone
Back at base, bugs in the software
Flash the message, "Something's out there"
Floating in the summer sky
99 red balloons go by.

99 red balloons floating in the summer sky
Panic bells, it's red alert
There's something here from somewhere else
The war machine, it springs to life
Opens up one eager eye
Focusing it on the sky
As 99 red balloons go by.

99 Decision Street, 99 ministers meet
To worry, worry, super-scurry
Call out the troops now in a hurry
This is what we've waited for
This is it boys, this is war
The president is on the line
As 99 red balloons go by.

99 Kriegsminister
Streichholz und Benzinkanister
Hielten sich für schlaue Leute
Witterten schon fette Beute
Riefen: Krieg und wollten Macht
Mann, wer haette das gedacht
Dass es einmal soweit kommt
Wegen 99 Luftballons

99 dreams I have had
In every one a red balloon
It's all over and I'm standin' pretty
In the dust that was a city
If I could find a souvenir
Just to prove the world was here...
And here it is, a red balloon
I think of you and let it go.

[claymore]

I don't remember us singing that

[Anonymous]

I don't remember us singing that

Think we chanted it, my son!

[Silkie]

Wossamatta Jim?

Forgotten the passwords for our other log-ins again, have we?

[Anonymous]

.. worse than that ..also forgotten the username so I can't get my forgotten password!

[Silkie]

Your previous ID was jim.r if that helps.

[jim.r]

That helped enormously

[claymore]

Dim Twerp