By chairman Dinghies Newsletter 10 November 2022

Light Winds for Dinghy Day

About twenty CBYA members attended Dinghy Day on Wednesday 9th November, despite the light winds. An excellent turn out.

We sailed the new 420, which Alan Bailey discovered, and which has been restored beautifully by Alan & Peter. It sails very well: it feels light and responsive, even in soft wind. We plan to tweek it a bit to make it more comfortable to sit in. The new 420 has good trimming possibilities, which will enable CBYA sailors to take the next step in sailing a dinghy by enjoying sailing with a spinnaker and trapeze. However, we need to be careful to launch it in deep enough water to avoid getting sand in the centre board case.

With the help of usual ‘gang’, and some newbies, we had both 420s, both Lasers and the safety boat out. Peter, Jiesoon and Doris sailed the 470 that Peter jointly owns with Alan.

We now have four new walkie-talkie radios with waterproof pouches to allow the dinghies on the water to stay in constant touch with the shore, an excellent additional safety feature. We have also purchased a floating marine VHF radio for better communications with the offshore safety boat manned by the two Peters. John Lilley has built a simple step, fashioned from rigid plastic tube and rope, to make it easier to get out of the water and into the inshore safety boat. We are also experimenting with a small rope ladder for offshore crew recovery from the sea.