A gloriously warm and sunny Saturday brought lots of participants down to Manly Cove today. Some of our most experienced volunteers – Eli, Denis, Ken, Jeremy and Michael – were away representing us at the Sailability conference in Bathurst, and our remaining crew of volunteers had their work cut out! They rose to the challenge, with Warwick and John running the show and taking turns to skipper Charlie’s Chariot, with Sophie and Clare also taking turns at the helm. Caroline did a stellar job of co-ordinating not only the sailing schedule but radio comms too.
The wind was a fickle south-westerly that kept dropping and changing gradually throughout the morning, but today’s sailors Steve, Sandy, Michael, Rob, Helene and Jackie handled it skilfully. On land, Victoria, Joe, David, Ros and Helen made sure all our participants were signed in, safely kitted out in lifejackets, and helped into the boats.
It was wonderful to see many of our regular members come sailing today. Judith was out sailing solo, and Ben came down with his mum, Betty, who got a ride on Charlie’s Chariot while Ben sailed. The team at CPA brought Vanessa, Meaghan and Anna – who wasn’t quite well enough to sail but enjoyed being amidst the action on the dock. Peter came and went for a sail with Helene, and regular visitor Paul was out on the water too. Jay spent a lot of his time helping out on the dock, before setting sail with Rob.
We were also joined by Elliot, Stephen and their mums, while Kevin and Aimee at Sargood brought Craig and Samantha. A large group from Care Culture – Jai, Kiki, Jake, Owen, Elsa, Dyl, Luke, Henry and Riley – and another from Krisnal – Alex, Darren, Retishav, Akhil, Rohit, Arjun and Sachin – made for a busy dock, but their patience and the hard work of our volunteers meant that everyone got their turn out on the water. Thank you to everyone involved in making today a success!
