The weekend saw us rush off down to Portsea for a bit of a bike ride down to the infamous Port Phillip Heads to watch Mistress P's mum's new boat (an Elliot17; a 56 foot racing boat, and 25th in last years Sydney-Hobart) head through on the slack water, on the way up to Qld.When we first saw Rager, they seemed miles and miles away, off Blairgowrie, and I looked at my watch and said to Mistress P: "She reckons they'll be here by 3:30 - I reckon she's dreaming!"
We then sauntered off and stopped at "Eagles Nest" which is the lookout bunker on a small peak near the Point (its all old concrete army bunkers in
the hill designed to blast invading ships out of the water and protect Melbourne from invasion...) where they had a high powered binocular set up.They were getting a bit closer, but wow... when we looked through the binocs they were MOTORING (as in sailing fast... not literally on the motor).
And with 20+ knots of northerly they had 2 reefs in as well.
We held Mike up and gave him a look too, and we think he could see something cos he did say "boat" (and maybe even "Yayas boat"; I cant quite recall now) a couple of times...
Suddenly we realised that we were actually in a bit
of a race to make it to the Point and see them through, as the lad was pretty keen on walking himself and not being plonked in the converted bike trailer. So off we bolted...And found ourselves a spot below a beacon to wave them through with the bike trailer flag. Not that they would have been able to see it.
No sooner were they there than they were gone. This thing is seriously fast... like 11 - 12 knots. Ok, its no windsurfer, but for a boat thats damn quick.
Anyway, well worth seeing and a beautiful spot to have all to ourselves.
Enjoy the pics... (and yes, that is a giant beer bottle on their side...)
