The boys on the sloop BARBARIAN from Acklins Island, far out at the southern end of the Bahamas with their pride and joy, leaning out and racing................. The boats all have to be anchored at the start.... Then the first gun goes, which means everybody get a hold of the anchor line and get ready to heave.............. The second gun goes and they HEAVEand HEAVE which causes the boat to move forward while they heave on the halyard at the same time to raise the sails............. and there is a lot of screaming associated with this..............
But the racing is incredibly competitive............the captains on the tiller get instructions on how to do things from up to twelve crew members all at the same time.
The trawler "AMAZING GRACE" is the home base for the sloops LADY MURIEL and TIDA WAVE (photo left)......and on the right is a sloop racing past the stern of ARITA, with all her flags up in celebration of this magical sailing event............
Back on shore there would have to be at least thirty newly erected shacks selling food and booze and showering the crowd with music...............loud, loud music, till very late at night.......... All the crews end up at one shack or other and probably in all of them....... These shacks have all got incredibly colourful names and right next to the one above, there is one called "LIQUOR IS QUICKER"........... Now we are not suggesting in any way that the photo on the right had anything to do with that................. She did not have enough crew, tipped over and sank and was towed back into the harbour............. but everyone will be back in the shacks by nightfall....................... us too............ Liquor may be quicker, but I'll bet the head will be thicker............. TIDA WAVE, the Champ came in 5th today.........I didn't get a spot as the winds were too light and they needed to even off-load ballast...............maybe tomorrow.............
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