Its been a while since we have posted an update to the blog. Much has happened in the last 4 years! Most importantly we have been blessed with a son, Sean Pieter Kavanagh (he is now three years old, has over 12,000 sea miles and 55 flights under his belt already).

Last year we sailed Ray of Light from Turkey to Cape Town, South Africa where we now live. I will try to fill in the blanks in time, however we are now enjoying the club racing at Royal Cape Yacht Club on Ray of Light. The roller furler, overlapping genoa and solar panels are gone. We have a new suit of Quantum Fusion M sails and are learning to race short courses on a big boat.

For this season we have had the bottom professionally finished and faired by Gerry Heggie, Jnr, we have removed as much weight as possible and have updated out IRC handicap with a TCC of 1.105.

Our first event in our new guise was the Intasure Spring Regatta in False Bay. See a separate post for a detailed account of what was an enjoyable, but tough event.

Now we are into Wednesday night sailing. Puma are kindly sponsoring the twilight series this year. We have had a good start to the series with a second and a first in class 1 non-spinnaker. The boat is going well and Heidi is steering excellently. As an added bonus we have been fortunate to gain some insight from Dale Kushner on the trip back from False Bay to Cape Town after the Spring Regatta, from Jan Bol on the last two Wednesday's and Manuel Mendez yesterday.

Last night's race was sailed in a moderate Westerly of 12-17 knots. The course was the usual start between the bridge hut and #10, rounding #2 to starboard, Milnerton to starboard, #4 to port and the finish mark near the bridge hut to port. We considered starting on port tack as the line was difficult to lay on starboard. However we decided that it was prudent to approach the line on starboard. In the end we tacked onto port on the gun, near the pin, but were blanketed by the 50 footers Thunderchild and Picasso, with the fast 42 Maestro going well a little further to weather.

We hung in trying to find clean air on the first leg, eventually rounding #2 mark in 4th. We manged to slip past Maestro shortly after the mark as they lost time trying to goose swing their genoa with their spinnaker pole. Once they got going they crept up on us, creating a little bit of a wind shadow. Heidi made a quick tactical decision to seek out clear air and better pressure and we altered course to starboard smartly. The rest of the run down to Milnerton mark was uneventful, as we gradually slipped past Picasso the Sovereign 54.

Heidi steered an excellent course around the mark. We were now second behind Thunderchild and three boat lengths ahead of Maestro. As we were settling into our rhythm for the beat, our jib halyard slipped, costing us a few boat lengths as we sorted it out. Once we tacked over to port, we had a close port / starboard crossing with Maestro, just clearing ahead of them. Form then on we had good breeze and clear air and we able to concentrate on finding the right balance between height, heel and speed. We seemed to be making good progress, eventually tacking over to starboard on the lay line for #4 mark, now well clear of the other boats in our class.

We had to pinch a little as we closed on the mark, but got a little puff in answer to Heidi's prayer taking us around. From there we had a straight forward reach to the finish to take line honours in our class. Our time of just under an hour was good enough to take a handicap win as well, our first in Wednesday night racing.

Well done to all the crew, Heidi, Jan, Manuel and Dickie, Bea (who looked after Sean), Amanda (on debut), Laurence, Shoaib, Werner, Sophie, Elmarie and Michael.

Heidi, Sean and I are off to Rotterdam for Saskia's graduation next week, so we will miss the next two rounds of Wednesday racing. We look forward to being on the water again on 9 Nov.