DOC FELLOWS ATTEMPT

Well, we all get an “A” for effort on this one… About fifteen boats showed up for the first NEIYA event of 2022, in fact the first one since 2020. Damariscotta Lake in Jefferson, ME was the place.

We had everything we needed- great ice (thanks to Bill and the Maine gang for scouting it and telling us about it), a great launch area (thanks to the folks at Camp Wavus), and plenty of competitors, from grizzled vets to total newbies (Let’s welcome Luke Ralph and his buddy Jonathon to the cult- uh, I mean club).

The missing ingredient was wind. Light and shifty all day, never settled down enough to get a full race in. Three were started, one completed but not enough to get a regatta in the books so we will give it another shot after the DN Nationals. Stay tuned to this site for details!

Of course the breeze did come up as the sun was setting and a few boats were able to spend some time ripping it up before packing it in and heading home. Plenty of socializing and catching up was done during the slow patches. A few new potential sailors came out and took their first rides as well, we hope they will follow up and get involved!

We will see what the crazy weather has done to the ice- Hope it is still intact as the surface was really nice, easily an 8 or so- As an aside I looked at the weather radar Sunday afternoon and saw that the system that was on the way stretched from Nassau, Bahamas to Ottowa, Canada and back down to Nashville, Tennessee. Pretty impressive!

Thanks to all who showed up and kept the hope alive- And to all the folks who tried out the older boats and would like to get involved feel free to email me at t_thieler@yahoo.com.

Think Ice!!