Our intention was to hold the Rendezvous on February the 24th and stay overnight at Darling Harbour, but despite communication going back months with the marina operators, it’s only just come to light that a Dragon boat regatta on the same weekend will limit our access to Darling Harbour until after 6pm. Given the logistics of moving up to 40 yachts onto the marina, to not be able to bring the first raft of yachts in through the opening bridge until then will simply spoil the whole evening we feel, as it will be far too late before we are ready to move to the venue for the evening function. In addition the marina is holding space for Dragon-boats overnight, which they also didn’t tell us, which would mean the loss of 10 marina berths.
So with great reluctance we feel that we have no choice but to change the date. We realise that some of those yachts that had confirmed interest may not be able to attend on the new date, and for that we do apologise, but trying to find dates that will suit the schedule, and all owners, is a difficult task as you will appreciate.
With the new date of April the 21st we have now confirmed marina space for yachts coming from beyond Sydney harbour to overnight at Middle Harbour Yacht Club on Friday night the 20th, so then all participants will converge at the Sydney Yacht Squadron at 10am on the Saturday morning and RSYS have confirmed that they are comfortable that they can accommodate us all. Then we will finish up the day at Darling Harbour where we will now have the full 40 of 42 spaces available to us and can choose bridge opening times to suit us, so will be able to come in and out in two or three stages. All participants do not have to attend the overnight at Darling harbour, so for those of you who keep your yachts on the harbour and would prefer to take your yachts home after the days sailing and still attend the function, that is fine. We’ll send out a notice and questionnaire in coming weeks to clarify some of the details and ask each owner for confirmation of these sort of details.
I hope that you understand that, reluctant as we are to change it, we feel that this new date will make for a much better day and we look forward to seeing as many of you as possible on the day.
“The PBS Team”