if you can sail in Aruba.....

Good friend Rik has gotten in some adventurous sailing down in Aruba.  He entered his Pathfinder VANESSA in an international regatta, going through the steps (I'm not a race and don't quite understand how it works) to get a rating for his boat in the open class.  I'll put some excerpts from his emails and let him tell the story.

VANESSA

The Pathfinder is a very seaworthy boat. The strong winds tried to tip her over, the waves tried to sink her... we still won Yachts (on rating).  All I really need to work on now is to install the big waterpump.

They have a sol called CSA (caribbean sailing ...) rating which is specific for the environment we have here. They gave me a .662 rating which was the lowest of the boats. The next one was a 28 ft yacht. They had a .7 something rating. I sailed in the open class. Had to learn lots of stuff fast but it was all worth it. My buddy Alex sailed 3 of the 4 races with me. Total amount of sailing hours over sateurday and sunday was about 10 hours. So with blistered hands but a very satisfied mind I look forward to next year's regatta already. 

VANESSA at lower left

Forgot to mention that all races were sailed with winds around 25 knots with gusts way up higher... In one terribly hard knock we nearly had the sail in the water, but she just fell back horizontal and kept sailing... but the boat was completely swamped. We got it out and kept going. Awesome design. In the racing class two spinackers were ripped to shreds, some Beachcats tumbled over, but the Optimist kids were champs and sailed hard through it all.

If you can sail here, you can sail anywhere...

Out of the 4 boats in our class we came in 2nd. With about 105 seconds away from the 1st place. That will have to be the target next year...

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I believe it when Rik says if you can sail in Aruba you can sail anywhere.  From the photos and videos I have seen from VANESSA over the years their typical weather would match some of the roughest conditions I have sailed in.  Well done, Rik, congratulations on a some great sailing.