Despite a miserable weekend of weather and all of the concerns re the current crisis our annual owners get together on the weekend of the 14th & 15th of March was a roaring success. Returning to Sydney Harbour for this year’s event with the fleet overnighting in Darling Harbour was a popular choice, and despite multiple understandable cancelations in the week prior we still had 33 yachts attend, 22 of which made it into Darling Harbour while a full gale blew outside.
Those yachts that sailed down from Newcastle, Lake Macquarie, and Pittwater on Friday afternoon had champagne sailing and made their way to the Cruising Yacht Club of Australia for a breakfast briefing on Saturday morning.
The morning was bleak with rain and winds gusting 35 knots, so prudently the decision was made to cancel sailing on the harbour, and for those confident to berth in Darling Harbour to do so.
The CYCA was a perfect venue for the morning briefing and we would especially like to thank The Quays Marina for sponsoring it. Also thanks to the staff at the club for being so accommodating and finding space for all of our yachts.
While we were very disappointed to have cancelled the sailing for the first time ever for a Rendezvous a very enjoyable afternoon was spent by everyone inspecting each other’s boats and sharing ideas and experiences.
And so before we knew it was time to walk to the Pyrmont Bridge Hotel where we had a large function area to ourselves which was perfect for the 139 attendees. The food was terrific and atmosphere with live music and lots of banter was quite special. In attendance from Jeanneau was Mathilde Dalfour, the Asia/Pacific sales manager and we would like to thank her for taking the time to be a part of the event.
As usual we had a draw for spot prizes and we would particularly like to thank The Quays Marina for offering two $1500 antifouling vouchers, SB Marine Trimming for two $500 vouchers, Vacuwash a $500 voucher, three $300 vouchers from On Deck Rigging, $300 voucher from Marine Tune, $300 from Skinner Shipwrights, $200 voucher from Michaels Boat Detailing, Champagne from Boatstripes, a marine stereo and speakers from Ocean Phase, Hood Sails discount voucher, two Club Marine insurance vouchers, and multiple spot prizes from boatcrew.gear.com, Harken, and Yaffa Media. I’m sure that I speak for all of our owners when I say how much we appreciate the generous support of the industry around us.
So, despite multiple challenges the day was a great success based on the feed-back that we’ve received, and I would personally like to acknowledge the huge amount of work that Jay McEvoy here at PBS put into making it so.
An enjoyable night was spent at Darling Harbour and leisurely morning before the bridge opening at 10am. For those yachts heading back North a brisk S ’Easterly made it an exciting sail and a great way to top off the weekend.