Notice to OPO Mariners, October 1, 2006
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Hank Schmitt, P.O. Box 2032, Halesite, NY 11743
631-423-4988, 1-800-4PASSAGe, Fax 631-423-9009
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Editorial
As everyone knows, fall is the busy season. If you are looking for a trip this fall and do not get aboard a boat in the next two weeks, feel free to give me a call or e-mail and let me know what you are looking to do. If you do not have much time we have some short opportunities in the Northeast this month as well as one week trips.
We ran into George Day, the editor of Blue Water Sailing Magazine, at the Newport Boat Show and he asked us to mention their new weekly "Compass Log" e-mail letter. You can subscribe for free and get interesting news about sailing once a week. They recently printed comments from us. They asked for any interesting equator crossing stories. Although they were probably expecting stories about "King Neptune" rituals or long arduous passages, we e-mailed about crossing the equator and seeing if indeed the water did flush down the toilet in the opposite direction just as we crossed the equator...It does. To subscribe and get many more interesting information from the editors of Blue Water Sailing please go to the Blue Water Sailing web site at www.bwsailing.com and register for the weekly updates.
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Annapolis Boat Show
It has been a ritual to meet OPO members at the boat Shows. In Newport we even hooked up an OPO skipper with an OPO crew sailing from Newport to Florida. I know we will have at least one skipper besides me looking for crew at the Annapolis Boat Show. Anyone wanting to meet us at the Annapolis Boat Show on Thursday should be at the 2nd floor food court above the Pusser's Rum bar by the Marriot Hotel. It is where they have the seminars. I plan to be there between 1:00 and 2:30 pm. Hope to see you there.
If you are planning to be at the show or live in Annapolis on Monday and want to join us at the end of the show at the Beneteau display, we are going to help move some of the boats from the show to Spa Creek. I will be at the show in the afternoon so e-mail me with your cell phone number and we can plan to meet that Monday afternoon. It should not take very long and I have always heard it is a lot of fun to watch the Sail boat show breakdown and the Power Boat Show move in at the same time.
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Mini Cruise
These will be some of the same boats we will be sailing to Newport the following weekend after the show. Crew will meet in Spa Creek Saturday Oct 14th for dinner and last minute provisioning. We will depart Sunday morning for Chesapeake City to spend the night. OPO members Bill and Carla Miners (Members # 1) live in the City and will be making arrangements for us to dock and make reservations for all 18 OPO members and skippers in the group. If the Canal Museum is open on Monday morning we can visit before setting sail for Cape May New Jersey where we will stop again for the night. The next day we will sail to Atlantic City or all the way to New York City depending on the weather. If we stop in Atlantic City we will stay at a casino Marina and we can spend some quarters in the slots. In New York we will berth right past the Statue of Liberty on the New Jersey side of the harbor. OPO Member Charles Moshino has a very nice restaurant very close to where we will be docking and is setting aside a room for us at his restaurant. If we arrive a day early we may stay for a visit to visit New York City. The next stop will be in Northport NY at the town dock which is across the street from the town. Weather will dictate weather we have time for a stop in Greenport NY or sail directly for Newport from there. We will be in Newport Saturday Oct 21st for travel day Sunday to get home. Some crew will be driving from Newport to BWI Airport near Annapolis to complete a round trip airplane ticket to and from BWI. We have a couple of berths left in our small fleet of three or four Beneteaus. Only $900 for the ten days plus a share of dockage and partial provisions. Discounts for couple in the same cabin. Call or e-mail if you want to join us. Hank 631-423-4988.
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Winter Caribbean Circuit
We said that we would start taking deposits for the winter Regattas in the October OPO Notice. We have already rented a five bedroom deluxe suite overlooking the town of Marigot for the Heineken Regatta. The dates are to fly into St. Martin on Monday Feb 26th and fly home on Monday March 5th. You will have a place to stay between those dates. Last year we had two crew bring their spouses who did not race, but were able to stay in the deluxe accommodations we have. We have ordered a new carbon fiber Spinnaker pole and may buy a new number one sail to stay on the top of our game. Last year we did very well with a 2nd place at the Heineken Regatta. This year we again plan to have one other pro onboard. Mark Washeim of Doyle Sails Huntington Loft sailed with us last year and has agreed to sail with us again for another regatta. If you want to reserve a berth for either the Heineken or BVI Regatta (Those dates are to fly into Tortola Monday March 26th and fly home Monday April 2nd.) We will have at least two days of practice before each regatta. We are not taking deposits for Antigua Sailing week and will let you know next month in the Nov 1st Notice if we will have berths for this 3rd major regatta of the Winter Circuit. The prices for the regattas including a place to stay and race aboard are: Heineken Regatta - New Crew $2400 and veteran crew who have sailed with us before $1900. Includes Team shirts and ground transportation and two pro-sailors for maximum sailing exposure.
The BVI regatta we also sailed in last year and we had two third place finished before raising our insurance premium on the starting line of the third race. This year we are not sailing in the BVI festival before the BVI Regatta so we can get a couple days of practice in before the real racing starts. We will have one or two support boats to stay aboard other than aboard Avocation and will practice and sail to a couple of our own islands before the Race Week starts with the first party on the night of March 29th. The price for the BVI Regatta is $2200 new folks and $1700 for veterans.
Send in a deposit of $500 now to secure a berth and make sure you will be joining us this winter. We know these two mid winter regattas will fill up soon.
This is the best time of year for offshore passage opportunities. If you do not get any more e-mails this week it may be because you did not send in your annual dues of $125. New members and people who paid last year do not need to worry. If you already sent in your $125 dues. Thank you. If you have not sent them in yet this is the final notice other than a letter we may send you later this year. After the October 1st Notice only active members will continue to get the many free opportunities that will flow through the OPO system this year. You may re-activate at anytime by simply sending in your annual dues of $125 with out any penalties. The new active address book will start with the next e-mail notice.
Thanks,
Hank
Enjoy the following opportunities and call me if you are having trouble landing a ride south this fall.
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NARC Rally
NARC Rally - Besides the usual opportunities on a Swan we will be sailing three or four Beneteaus south this year to Tortola rather than St. Martin. I will be skippering one of them. The price to crew is $2200 which includes everything except your airfare to and from the boat and money for stops in Bermuda. Let us know if you are interested.
Trans-At - Anyone that could not leave early enough for the Beneteua Trans-At (They left this past weekend) have another chance to sail from the Canary Islands aboard the Swan 60 Marie Blue with Captain Murray Jacob. If you are interested in joining Murray in the Canary Island in early October. Please e-mail or call me and I will help put it together for you.
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