Race Day! – 18th
August
Race number one – End of Lembeh
Passage Race and around the islands. Distance = 15 miles completed in 1 hour 43
mins. Astra was first over the start line at
14:10. We all worked really hard
during this race constantly trimming the sails to get the best performance out
of Astra. We crossed the finish line which was
the start of the next race some 26 minutes ahead of the next yacht in the fleet
(pretty good going for such a short race).
Race number two – Lembeh Passage to
Wori
Bay. Distance = 63 miles completed in exactly
8 hours. The first half of this
race was spent sailing downwind cruising at around 8.5 knots through the
water. Just after sunset that
evening, a pod of dolphins started playing around Astra. This was an amazing site to see the jet
streams from the dolphins being lit up by the plankton in the water. The wind eventually died as we changed
tack to head back down towards Manado and the engine went on for the last few
hours of the race. We crossed the
finish line just before midnight and had to make our way into a tricky Wori bay
in the dark to anchor for the night.