The weekend of Friday 27th through to Sunday 29th saw the village centre being a hive of activity with the trick and trail on the Friday and the clubhouse was apparently visited by spirits including vampires and Dracula himself (or was that herself) in the form of Nicky, Mel and other members of the junior rowing teams making good use of the clubhouse.

The festivities and excitement continued on the Saturday with the annual Big Bang event put on by the Saundersfoot Chamber of Tourism, which this year saw a ‘double bang’ with two helpings of fireworks and a light show which were enjoyed by all so well done to them and to all of our members and guests who gathered in the village and the clubhouse for two nights of fun with a disco, food, drinks and raffle and general forms of merriment, great to see the clubhouse so busy and a big thanks to those who organised it all.

Gypsea Girl is away this week in her Romany caravan gathering fresh supplies of ‘lucky heather,’ clothes pegs and apparently fermented mackerel (good luck getting that through customs), while the senior Mammatt’s were also away on a romantic break in the Gower (the Swansea one! not the hotel in the village), hopefully, they all enjoyed their breaks away so the ‘Dizzy’ team are standing in for one week.

Sunday 29th saw the latest round of the Frostbite series and with several away or otherwise occupied, including the SSC contingent who have now acquired cruisers as well. There was a smaller turnout than usual, but it was good to get out after the storms of the last few weeks. Although one casualty of the recent storms was the disappearance of the Amroth buoy as previously reported so race officers Martin and Alan had to improvise, together with the safety crews of Keith and Paul, plus Mark and Trish (with Terry on shore patrol), but settled on a triangular course of Pendine, Monkstone, harbour in quite a fresh and gusty wind. A long line was set to keep us away from the harbour, but the distance made it difficult to see the flags and this resulted in an unusual general recall on the first attempt, but everyone got away safely at the second on quite a fast reach to Pendine, although too tight for the gennaker boats seeing James and Simon in the Phantom and Contender respectively pull away.

The wind swung around a bit and the changing wind and strong gusts saw Paul and Julia pull through in the RS 200 on the next lap with all three boats virtually side by side for the next lap or so until on the final lap the wind dropped almost completely on the three leaders who just had to watch new recruit Alex plane up behind them to take the win ahead of Paul and Julia, then James.

The course was tweaked slightly for the second race, but the strong gusts had taken their toll, and this time, the win was taken by James (former Ironman!), ahead of Paul and Julia with their second second place of the day ahead of the tiring Alex who was performing some acrobatic capsizes to keep the safety boats entertained.

A big thank you to all of those on duty on a sunny, but quite cold and blustery day.

No club racing this weekend. There is a regatta on at Tata Sailing Club (Port Talbot) which the Dizzy team are planning to go to if anyone else is interested, but after that club racing will resume with two scheduled races on November 12, at 11.30 am.

Dizzy Rascals