After a couple of weeks when your scribe was absent, what with Easter and all, and the weather was bordering on the ‘very unpleasant’ end of the scale with no sailing it was good to get back into on Saturday with a, at most 12kn and at least, 6kn breeze albeit in rather cool conditions.

Division 1 sailors were Peter E, Clive H (his first Indented Head sail for a while) and visitors Jason and Ben from St Leonards, all sailing Radials. We seem to benefit from the early closure of St Leonards and Royal Geelong OTB programs. Division 2 had Andrew D, Geoff D and Tony in Sabres and Andrew and Lew on the 420. There was some very close racing on the day.

In Div 2 race 1 Geoff seemed to have Andrew covered for long periods giving Andrew some competition he has been missing. After a number of swaps Andrew led at the finish by 24 seconds. Tony who seemed to have had a flustered start trailed Geoff by 58 seconds while Andrew G and Lew had a race they would rather forget and were 11 minutes back. Racing was tight in the second race as well and, on the start boat, we saw covering tactics being applied by Geoff. But Andrew again prevailed by a short 28 seconds. Tony was 3 minutes behind Geoff with the 420 a much better 3 minutes down.

Division 1 race 1 Peter E and Clive put in the close racing with Peter E triumphing by 19 seconds. Ben from St Leonards was 2 and a 1/2 minutes back and ahead of Jason by 2 minutes. A good effort from Ben who had sailed down from St L and had to sail back after the last race. In race 2 Peter E tried to be a bit too clever and put in a ‘dip’ start at the pin end. Unfortunately there was a bit of port bias on the line and most boats were at the pin end leaving no space for Peter to ‘dip’ into (he was windward boat and had to tack to port) and causing him to be on the wrong tack as everybody got going. (There were even some on the start boat who wondered if he had got clear to the start side but Peter V prevailed) Clive took advantage and was ahead of Ben at the line by about a minute with Peter E 2 seconds behind Ben. Jason trailed Ben by 34 seconds.

Thanks to Peter V who set the course in tandem with Glen on the crash boat. Your scribe waved flags at everyone and, while searching for the ‘S’ flag for race 2, managed to snag the trigger line that blows up the life jacket. You will be pleased to know that the thing works quickly and loudly. As it happens you can’t actually move much once the jacket is aerated, so in the interests of doing stuff I had to remove it. Fortunately Glen had a spare on Dennis Jones. It is great to have Glen around as he was able to demonstrate that the blow up life jackets are reusable with a fresh CO2 container. Ashore he showed how to repack the life jacket and re-insert a new CO2 container. Turns out that you must remember to close the previously opened ‘trigger’ as when you screw the gas thing, if not shut, it blows up again. Glen has taken the jacket home to fiddle.
Again we had the services of Tractor John as an additional safety boat on his jet ski and have added a safety sled to the gear to go with it.
Julie spent her day talking to people and introducing the Club while Anne manned the tower.

Coming up:

Saturday 25 April 2026.
1400​Bengalut Balug series concludes.

Saturday 2 May 2026.
Day 1.​Sail Bellarine Regatta
Day 2.​Sail Bellarine Regatta

With no sailing over the winter your scribe had a bit of spare time which he put to use by borrowing a couple of books from the Club so he could learn to navigate. Here are some of the things he learnt:
Compass bearing on two points:
When three suitable points are in view simultaneously a separate compass bearing may be taken from each. Ideally the two outer points should be at an angle of sixty degrees to the centre point although, in practice, this condition is not likely to be achieved, so greater or lesser angle must be accepted.
• Observe the bearings from each point.
• Plot a straight position line to lay off the true bearing obtained from the first point.
• Repeat for the second point
• Repeat for the third point
• Read off the fix from the, usually a triangle (cocked hat) formed, as the closest to danger.
Although the sextant can be more accurate than the compass, the compass should preferably be used as the ‘cocked hat’ which will generally result, provides a check on the intrinsic accuracy of the fix not available with sextant angles, but most desirable when the observations were made from the unsteady platform of a small boat underway in coastal waters and, quite possibly, some distance out to sea.