mullerb's musings

Here's the view from my desk at the BoM at 1010 LaTrobe Street in Melbourne this morning. Well, actually, it's the view I get when I turn around in my chair; I have to make sure I don't look out too often as it gets too distracting to get any work done. The whole area has undergone a huge revitalization effort and is called The Docklands. The old defunct docks and storage buildings have been replaced in the past few years with modern mixed use buildings. There must be more than 20 restaurants along the pier to the right down there. Makes for nice lunch meetings :-) It's been fun to wathc that huge ferris wheel go up over the past 2 months. It's supposed to be a rival to the big one in London. The building we're in is only a year old and is shared with the Australian Customs Service. Lots of armed folks wandering around, constantly heading out to the bigger container port just down the river. There's a tram stop outside the front door and a major rail station...

So one of my biggest hopes with coming over here was to hook up with a local sailing club and get out as crew for racing. And I have! Very easy to get set up here as there are 4 or 5 clubs within a few kilometers of Brighton. I chose the Sandringham Yacht Club ( http://www.syc.com.au/ ) as it has a more casual reputation. I filled a form, got a call within a half hour, and got invited to crew on a 32' Jarken cruiser/racer. Ken Gaylor, the owner of Salt Shaker, is a retired professor of biochemist from Melbourne University. What a good guy! He's sharp at tactics, easy going on the crew, really competitive on the course, and has a lot of fun. I raced a number of times now with Ken on a Wednesday afternoon summer series. No spinnakers allowed in this one so it's all about tactics and timing. We've done well! A couple of 1st place finishes, a 2nd place spot (just yesterday), and few less well-placed finishes to mention. There's usually around 35 boats racing. They use a...

I decided to by a used JP Excite 120l demo board from SHQ ( http://www.shq.com.au/ ). I also picked up a North 430 30% carbon mast and a boom. Andrew is kindly supplying me with a nice 6.0m, 5.3m, and a 4.2m set of sails. So I'm set to take advantage of the water here. I also bought a trolley for A$25 at the Homedepot knock off, Bunnings. I can strap all the gear to the trolley. Andrew has a spot next to his house where I can leave it and it's only a short 5 minute stroll to the nearest launch site. No complaints so far. I've only been out on it a few times with winds under 18 kt but it seems to do well for me. I haven't been out in strong enough winds to consistently nail a water start, but I'll get there...