Good Lord!!
Last update was November 5? And here it is past Christmas...
Where to start? I guess the biggest news for the PSC is the granting of space at the Cultural Center and the building and erecting of the new Sailing Shack that happened over a week ago now. So, if you haven't been sailing over the holiday season, shame on you, but now you'll find a 6'x6'x9' high shed beside the security shack at the cultural center. The same old lock is on the shackle and the key is hanging behind the shed for now. I will be tallying who has paid their dues for the '08 season and sending out a reminder email in early January. After that point I will only be sending out emails to paid members of the club for upcoming events etc. and I will be changing the lock to a combination lock for members knowledge only.

So, if you are still interested in sailing our Hobies but have not paid up yet, please make arrangements to do so.

I will be posting another entry with a few pics in the next while. Please check back again.
Pat

Try again this Sunday?

According to windguru.com, it looks like we might get lucky with some decent wind this Sunday. If anyone would like to commit to racing at 10 am for this coming Sunday Nov. 11 please send me an email or respond to this post below. Thanks.

Shut out again!

Oh well, good intentions shut down by no wind and huge surf. Sunday's scheduled race day was a non-event unfortunately. However, four of us made good use of the lack of wind and fixed the leaking hatches on another boat. Mike, Paul Fletcher, Noel Percival and I spent an hour visiting, wishing for wind and taking apart the hatches on a boat that was less than water proof.

What follows below is a good combination of Mike Rosati's experience on how to fix a boat, Paul Fletcher's suggestion to document how to fix the boat, Noel's photography skills and my posting abilities (and tools).

Step 1: Find the leaky hatch.
Paul described how he took out one of the boats and had to drain the hulls 3 times! So, time to get busy. Under each seat pad is a round plastic hull cover fastened to the hull with six screws. Mike's suggestion to find the leaky hatch was to remove the drain plug and use a kiteboard pump to "inflate" the hulls. Worked like a charm - the leaky hatch started to hiss and was further identified by pouring a little water to see bubbles form around the hatch cover.

Step 2: Remove and clean the hatch
The plastic hatch is held in place by 6 easily removed screws. We used a sharp paint scraper and a knife to remove any dried glue and sand encrusted glue underneath the seat pad.




Step 3: Apply Goop
Once cleaned up apply a liberal bead of Marine Goop (actual glue product) around the hatch opening and place the hatch cover back over the screw holes and screw back into place.





Step 4: Spray adhesive
Next, the seat pad needs to be glued down using a spray adhesive. I used 3M's product that should be allowed to set up for 5 or 10 minutes before pressing the seat pad back in place. Don't be afraid to apply lot's of spray adhesive. Do be afraid of overspray covering your watch face. I'm hoping I can remove the oversprayed adhesive with Goo Gone!

Repeat the above steps for each hatch that you find leaking and don't sail the repaired boat for a day. That should do it for another year!

UK Halsey Racing Quiz

Thanks to Simon Wood for the following link:

www.ukhalsey.com/RulesQuiz/index.asp

This is a great site and worth spending some time understanding the rules of racing. The animations keep it interesting and give you a good understanding of rights of way etc.

Now there will be no excuses on Sunday's race day..."STARBOARD"!!!!!

Thanks again Simon!

Mike fixed our wheel!

Mike just called me and said he has fixed our tire on the cat trolley and he will have it back on tomorrow. He's keen for racing on Sunday (see last posting), so see you there - the more the merrier!

Here's the Happy little Commodore delivering our new boat from a few weeks ago!

See you Sunday! If anyone wants to show up a little earlier than 10 (eg 9am) to help me set up please let me know. Thanks!

First Race Event for '07/'08: this Sunday Nov. 4

Just a quick reminder that Sunday November 4 is the first Sunday in November, the first Sunday of the 2007/2008 racing season and also Daylight Savings time. So, turn your clocks back an hour Saturday night but still get up for racing at 10 am on the beach! The new boat is ready and waiting...

Also, only a handful of members have paid or contacted me to make payment for the '08 year. Please make arrangement to drop off your waiver forms to me or Becky Carlson as soon as possible as year end was yesterday. Or, bring your info and cheque to the beach on Sunday and we can get it then.

Happy Sailing!

Minutes of the AGM last week

Here it is a week gone by already and I’m just now sending out the minutes to the meeting last week. What follows below is the main Agenda items followed by the discussion and outcome.

It was a good meeting but only 8 of us were in attendance. Lot's of good ideas and discussions.

If anyone has any suggestions or comments please leave a comment using the link below. Thanks!

Attendees (I hope I didn’t miss anyone):

Pat Staples

Becky Carlson

Nelson Nakao

Gary and Margot MacFadyen

Mike Rosati

Raymond Cushnie

Paul Fletcher

AGENDA:

1. Welcome everyone and introduction of new members.
• Welcome Nelson who is now certified by Mike and spent last Sunday sailing most of the day with his wife Lumi (sp?)
2. New boat has arrived and is ready to sail! New wheels coming…
• The boat is on the beach and I think I was the first to sail her. The rudders are Hobie’s new design which is much simpler to set up and operate. The sheet goes directly to the foot of the sail between the rudder and the sail rather than over the rudder handle like on the old boats. Pushing the rudder handle down sends the rudders into the down and locked position, pushing the rudder handle up brings the rudders back up – no cam to worry about. Make sure you remove the plastic pins that lock the rudders in the up position BEFORE you start sailing. Any questions call me or Mike Rosati.
3. New sail box or shed? And where to locate it?
• If we can get permission from DECR to locate a “shed” on their land then all we need is a plan and some volunteers to build it. Simple one pitch roof, 6’x6’ square building with a single door in it, 9’ high to allow for sails to stand up and dry in racks.
• I’ve given a basic drawing to a friend who is going to draft it up and then I can present it formally with a letter to DECR. Might require a bit of assistance from Honourable Williams…
4. Discussion of revised fee schedule taking into consideration mostly absentee members paying a reduced membership fee.
• The members present discussed an absentee rate and we all agreed that the existing price of a membership is low enough that it is one rate for all members
• All members will be asked to complete a waiver form and submit it annually with a cheque for $360. In return they will receive a receipt that they have paid and access to our boats. Becky noted that there have been members of the club who have used the boats but have not paid in the past. This is unfair to the rest of us who gladly pay our dues to use the boats and will not be tolerated going forward.
• To accommodate those who are not members of the club but want to race, we will charge a $30 drop in for a racing event (ie a Sunday morning). Mike Rosati will receive 50% of that rate for his involvement in helping with races and loan of boats etc. As well, members will chip in $5 each race day event which will go to Mike again for his help in the race days. Having Mike there with his skiff is a big bonus in case anything ever goes wrong and is well worth chipping into the kitty.
5. Publish a list of sailing dates in advance for racing days.
• We all decided that the first Sunday in each month will be a designated PSC sailing day! The “event” will start at 10am sharp on the beach and will be a series of races. We now have 4 of our own boats so we can determine ahead of time whether we need to use a couple of Mike’s boats depending on who is going to show up.
• That means that the first sailing event of the ‘07/’08 season will be Sunday November 4^th at 10am. Stay tuned for an announcement on this later on the blog and please respond if you plan on attending.
6. Publish a list of social events to put in our calendar
• Agreement by all that the PSC needs to do more social events to liven up the club and promote a “club” atmosphere
• Suggestion was to have a monthly social night at Rickey’s café (or even at someone’s home) on the Friday night before the monthly sailing event to keep it simple and to promote the racing spirit ahead of Sunday’s event.
• We will forgo next Friday night due to time constraints and due to a special event noted below:
7. Conch Festival participation – November 26/07
• Sailing down to this event last year was a blast and showed support for our Sloop Captain Brethren in Blue Hills, Sailor’s Paradise and Wheeland. This year’s event is on Saturday November 26 and is an all day event. Suggestion is to have our 4 boats sail down to the event in the morning and join the sloops at the Conch festival all day on the water. We can leave the boats chained up at Sailing Paradise overnight and sail back on Sunday or come back late Saturday afternoon. Regardless we will need to have sailor’s and passengers committed for one or both days to sail boats.
• Please keep checking the blog for more details or call me directly if you want to participate
• Don’t forget that even if the boats are spoken for, the Sloop Skippers all need extra crew and you can easily get out on the water that day with them.
• It was proposed that Friday November 18^th should be our first social at Rickey’s bar in order to coordinate sailor’s etc for the following Saturday sail to the Conch Festival. There will be a few things to coordinate such as carpooling and sailing back etc. for those who won’t be able to sail both ways.
• More to come as I get more details from Ross from the MHF.
8. A few Tshirts and hats are available for $20 each.
• Contact Pat Staples (Patrick.staples@express.tc) or 332-1072
9. Election of Board Members
• President remains me
• Treasurer remains Becky
• Desperately need a Secretary to help with admin stuff and minute taking etc. Let me know if you are interested in helping out.
  
• Desperately need a Social Director to help with social events and beach duties to start each race day. Margot volunteered but may not be here in the long run. Please let me know if anyone else is interested in helping.
10. Keep checking the BLOG: http://provosailingclub.blogspot.com
• Please make use of this tool. Add your comments and suggestions after each post. Send me pictures to include in the posts etc etc. Let’s really get this club where it could be with EVERYONE’s involvement.
11. Renewed membership dues (October 2007 - October 2008) $360 annually.
• If you have not paid your dues by end of October and are still sailing the boats – please stop. Please make arrangements to see me or Becky with your payment and completed waiver forms for the 07/08 season.
• There will be no pro-rating of the annual fee for past members. Pro-rating is only in the case of a new member who wants to join the club mid-year (which is why the rate went up $10 to make it $30/month on a pro-rated basis).
12. Fund Raising Event
• There was a suggestion that we should do a fund raising event at some point (Conch Festival was decided to be too soon – perhaps the Fool’s Regatta next year). With enough tickets sold the suggestion was to raffle a brand new Hobie Wave. This would take quite a bit of coordination and lots of Tickets sold to turn a profit but the prize is attractive enough. Something to keep on the back burner.

AGM

Hi all,
I would like to propose the date for the Annual General Meeting for the Club. Given past feedback on Thursdays being no good for some folks, and Friday nights and weekends being sacred, I would like to suggest Wednesday, October 17 (next week) for our meeting. We will have it at Rickey's Flamango Bar at the Cultural Centre where our boats are stored at 7:30 pm. Drinks and food will be on your own dime this time if you want to order anything - Rickey's beer has been clinically proven as the coldest on the island.

On the agenda:

• Renewed membership dues (October 2007 - October 2008) $360 annually. Please have a cheque or cash and a completed waiver form for the meeting. We will be giving out receipts to avoid any confusion on who has paid their dues and who hasn't, period.
  
• New boat has been ordered and will arrive late October - Mike has put the order in for a brand new Hobie Wave and we will be back up to a 4 boat fleet!
• New sail box or shed? Still trying to get a meeting with DECR to locate a small shed on their site to house our sails, sheets and buoys. As well, need to have someone help build it.
• Publish a list of sailing dates in advance for racing days.
• Publish a list of social evenings to put in our calendar. The last evening was a good little event and it was great getting a chance to know our new members.

So, if anyone has other agenda items to add please post them below for all to see and I'll add them for discussion that night. Please make a point of attending or at least replying whether you will be there or not. If you can not make the meeting, please make arrangements with me or Becky to make payment and hand us your completed waiver to keep on file. Please contact me if you need a copy of the waiver and I'll email it to you.

Thanks Everyone! Looking forward to getting the group together next Wednesday evening at Rickey's at 7:30pm.
Sailsman

A good Social!!

Well, here is the "new" blog site for the sailing Club. As you can see by the first post, we sort of got sidetracked somewhat thinking we were going to build a real website. Hopefully this will suffice for the interim and provide a useful space to share information and create some collaborative efforts.

Great social last night and great turn out. Thanks to all for showing up and offering your input and suggestions. I will do another note later on in preparation for the AGM next month that pulls some of the suggestions together. One thought after last night that I had was I don't see why we couldn't do a monthly social (perhaps on a Wednesday next time to allow the Rugby Dudes to join us) followed up on Sunday with a race day. As long as Rickey allows us to take over some space at his restaurant - we'll continue to call it our "Clubhouse" for the time being. I think it is a Win-Win for all.

That said, let's race on Sunday morning this weekend at 10am. I'm game to get as many people out there as we can and Mike is willing to have a few of his boats available for us. Typically what we do is all chip in $10 to go toward Mike's boats and for his help in setting the course etc. Any $ left over gets put into the bank for the future. This Sunday will be an exception as we did not bring this up at the meeting. The PSC will pick up Mike's tab and next time around we will be more organized on setting up a race day - certainly more notice.

The pic below is of Karl, Wes, Jeff Campbell, a friend of Jeff's and Noel Percival when we all sailed to Sailing Paradise together to join up with the Sloop Captains from the Maritime Heritage Federation earlier this year. It was a great down wind sail and very cool to be out on the water racing alongside the 25' to 30' sloops. Definitely needs to happen more.

So, see y'all on Sunday morning. I'd like to get out on the water by 10 am so if people showed up at 9:30 to help rig boats and do a rigging refresher course for those with less experience, that would be great. If we all chip in and rig boats together it doesn't take long to get out there.
Bye for now!
Post any comments you have using the feature below. Keep the communication going!
Pat

Happy New Year to the PSC and sailing community of Providenciales!