cisco said...

Started this thread for past or present Navy people who are passionate about sailing.

I hope you have some fun here. Cheers Cisco (ex ERA2).

cisco said...

I joined up in June 1966 as an apprentice at Nirimba.

My first encounter with sailing was 6 weeks later on my first leave. We were given the option of going to Snapper Island off Balmain to have a weekend of sailing from the Naval Cadet's base TS Sydney.

On the Saturday we were put into groups of 3 or 4 to sail their Corsairs. Most of the time was spent argueing who was skipper and how to sail the thing as none of us really had a clue what we were doing.

/quote]

I started sailing at about 12 getting crewing spots on Lightweight and heavy weight sharpies in SA. First sailing in pussers time was when I was posted to Leeuwin for 12 months, 1969/70 as the boatwork and seamanship instructor. Most of the boatwork was whalers, I had a motor cutter and steamed alongside the recruits as they rowed the whalers. I did get the occasional sail in the whalers too. Weekends I used to sail the bosun dinghies to various Perth clubs for club racing. Leeuwin never got the corsairs till after I posted out.
During my leave breaks in this period I built a moth and raced it at Nowra when I first got posted to Albatross. Only sailed it for 12 months before moving on to OK dinghies and the Finns for the next 37 years. During that period I also owned a Status 19 and an Endeavour 24, built and sailed a Farr 3.7 but always kept the OKs and Finns. Bought the Lexcen quarter tonner a few years ago when I started thinking about retirement. The idea being to step up to something for local cruising. I raced the Finn at the Masters Games in Canberra and the next one at Adelaide and ran into a lot of people I knew from the seventies and ex service men I knew. Lot of these people had retired at 50! and spent their time sailing the masters circuit etc.
I would really like an SS34 but they are generally out of my price range although some do appear cheaper occasionally. Was at a reunion a couple of years ago and a bloke I used to fly with bought one from Pittwater for $34,000, right place at the right time.

cisco said...

...I hope you have some fun here. Cheers Cisco (ex ERA2).