The Skutsje racing is a very big deal in Friesland and positioning your boat to get a good view takes a fair bit of planning. In addition we had invited Gezina & Gerrit out for the day which meant we needed land access. It worked out rather well, with ‘Rachel’ moored on the mainland and us on the island adjacent to the racing and a tender apiece to collect visitor’s and get back and forth. We were very lucky to get a mooring and we only managed by being naughty and mooring by the bin, in a space that’s reserved for access by the bin emptying boats – no way would they be along to empty it on a race day.

So part of the planning involved getting out of the boatyard and catching up with Rachel. By then, the heatwave had hit us and pretty much pinned us to the decks. Here’s some pretty pictures of our cruises en route to watch Wednesday’s race – and some not so pretty pictures of the mess left behind from the post race party on Monday. Appalling and not something often seen in the NL.

Tuesday’s race was abandoned as there wasn’t a breath of wind. Wednesday the heatwave broke and we had strong winds and some lively water – so lively that our little electric motor on our tender wasn’t man enough to cross the lake to pick up G & G. Malcolm kindly picked them up in his sturdier tender with his more powerful outboard and brought them across to us. To say it was rough doesn’t really fully express the conditions, however they arrived safe and sound … but wet….very wet… wetter than wet things. In fact I don’t think they could have been wetter if they had swam across.

By the time we provided Gerrit with a towel and a change of clothes, Gezina discovered that both there phones had drowned and, far worse, her essential medication inside a pill box which was inside her handbag which was inside a plastic bag; had dissolved. So there was no choice but for the intrepid duo of Malcolm and Gezina to turn around and head back to shore so that Gezina could drive back and get replacements.

When they arrived back the next time, they had made modifications to their transport!

After a rocky start (pun intended), we had a lovely day watching the racing from the vantage point of Francoise’ roofs (including Diesel the dog). Malcolm, again, transporting them back to land after we all enjoyed supper together – thank you.

After a lovely day I was quite tired when I went to bed and looking forward to a nice lie in and a lazy day … hmm.. remember that bit at the beginning where I said we’d parked illegally in the Bin Man’s space? Here he is…bright and early, bless him.

So we held off until he’d finished and then tied up again. After that the weather rapidly started to deteriorate

We spent a very uncomfortable and noisy night with the anchor down – our other friends around the corner broke free of their anchor, but we were fortunate enough to ‘hold’. They, and we, scuttled off through the bridge in the morning to quieter waters and had a lovely evening together. Quite tired now.