24th September 2011
Over the last couple of months I had fitted out Little Dragon ready for the new season and and I wanted to be sure that all was well for the Clarence River Classic Cruise in a couple of weeks. Sister Pat had just arrived and the weather looked ok if a bit blowy. So we headed off to the Big River Sailing Club at Harwood for the Saturday afternoon racing.
There was quite a strong SE blowing and the word was that it was likely to increase so we put a reef in. As it turned out it were over cautious and we shook it out during the second race.
Pat has far more racing experience than I have and I was extremely happy to let her take the helm. For the first time at Harwood Little Dragon got excellent starts. Well done Pat.
In the second race Pat was a bit miffed when she misjudged rounding the buoy, not far from Palmer's Channel, and we had to do a penalty turn. Good practice. When back on shore we learnt that there is a strong current ebbing Palmer's Channel while the Clarence River is still flooding. I'll know next time.
As our competitors ranged from an Impulse dinghy to an Access Liberty the results really depend on the vagaries of the handicapping yardstick. I reckon the whole afternoon was a great success - largely because Little Dragon seemed to be in fine form.
