We’re on!

The intense preparation is complete (hours on the sofa browsing the ‘windsurf’ section of Ebay). The plans are finalised (keep sailing in a big circle until you reach the spot you left from). The weather for the weekend looks perfect (it doesn’t really, but it’s the only weekend that fits with our busy schedules) – so we’re calling the Round the Isle of Wight by Windsurfer event on for this weekend!

Due to an administrative error, we’ve belatedly realised that the perfect tides we predicted for this weekend aren’t perfect after all (high water turned out to be low water). There’s an upside from this, which is that the planned early start isn’t necessary. Instead we can leave from Avon beach – which has a nice café – at about 11am. The downside is that if we don’t get around in the planned nine hours we’ll be finishing in the dark. We may even have to pack beer to help us around the last bit.

We actually have done some real training, as in all of us have got out on the water on the begged, borrowed and salvaged race boards and big rigs. Jono sailed out to Clacton’s windfarm. Clyde pottered around Christchurch harbour and I spent fifteen minutes pootling around off Southbourne. Job done.

Not that we're taking this lightly at all...

A couple of photos from the final training session

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