We met up with them at 9am and made Sea Flight ready to go. The sail over to IOB was marvelous considering it was very cloudy and windy. The boat is just so great with the full enclosures and generator. Melissa did a great job on the way and seemed to enjoy it. See... hanging out with the old folks isn't so bad... we have more experience and more money!
We spent the afternoon relaxing, reading, napping and sunbathing until time to make ready for the party. I had to put the finishing touches on the brandy cream sauce to go on top of the bread pudding that was my offering for the pot luck dinner ashore. We piled into Mark's new dinghy with the electric motor and set off for the party. The ride was slow as we were going upwind and were very much overloaded with 5 adults and gear. We finally made it to the marina and people there all waved us away. What!! The party was being moved to another place and boaters were being urged to go back to their boats as a cool front was due in within the hour with high winds expected. We never touched the shore, we turned right back around and went to the boat.
We made plans with several other boaters on the VHF radio to meet on board Sea Flight and have an impromptu party here. Brenda and I kicked into gear to begin making the boat ready for guests.
We were all so excited it took a while for us to decompress. Mark had been pretty stressed by it all I think, but we had all worked well together and there was no fear.
We went below and got dried off and into our jammies. It was decided that the impromptu party had been trumped by the bigger impromptu storm! We were officially in for the night. The sunset was a wet pitiful thing and we almost missed it. By this time, the winds had come down and the rain was a steady sprinkle.
We threw together a dinner for ourselves and spent the evening reliving the moves and calls that had made for the successful outcome of the event. We decided that it was a good thing after all that we had invited ourselves to join the Hilers on this adventure! Things always happen for a reason.. I firmly believe this.
We had some trouble with the generator in the night and it stopped working at about 2am. This was not so bad as the rain had stopped by this time and hatches were opened to let in the cool dry breeze. We all woke up between 7 and 8 am and Mark and Brenda figured out a way to make coffee with no power. It was sooo good!
The sail home began well under reefed main and jib. We ended up further reefing both once we got outside of the sheltering influence of land and into the bay. Thank goodness for the enclosure. It was a very stable ride across if a bit sloshy. Melissa succumbed to a bit of seasickness but she shouldn't feel bad. We saw 30 kt winds and these conditions were none that we would normally sail in voluntarily. She was a trooper. Her downfall had been to go below to make another round of mimosas. Never again!!
We made a flawless landing in ligntning speed time and fellow boaters began to gather to tell tales. The Mimosa party lives! Everyone had some aspect of the shared event to tell. It's really the best part of any sailing event... the aftermath. Ahhh it had been a fun weekend. We migrated to the Surf Club for a group lunch with further story telling. Kay was the one who crowned us with the perfect description of our weave around the anchorage that has become the title of this entry... it's how we will remember it. Hopefully Mark's new nickname... the Drag Queen will be short lived.
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