Sailing 101

To round off the long weekend, I spend Sunday treating myself to a new dress in the city (in preparation for celebrating Jess' freedom out on the town later this week), then got to try my hand at sailing with John. Despite growing up by the sea and trying just about every water sport in my childhood, I'd never sailed before today and I've definitely been missing out on something special.

With Vic out practicing for her play that starts next week and Prachie unable to swim, John and I hopped in the new Jag (a white, convertible beauty) and headed down to Nedlands Yacht Club, a place near my work where they keep their little catamaran. It should be noted, though avid blog-readers (No one? Just my Mum then; hi Mum) will know I've mentioned it before, that the awesome Billinghams had a big boat years ago and spent two years travelling the world on it with their kids. Who needs school anyway? Nowadays, however, their vessel is a lot smaller and less expensive, but still a lot of fun. We got everything set up and pushed it off into the water as John briefly took me through all the sailing terms, which I of course forgot instantly. Being a little boat in a river full of huge boats means bobbing around all over the place when you cross their wake; I was bloody soaked within a minute. After a albeit bumpy cruise across the river to the west bank with John steering, he handed me the tiller and it was down to me to guide us around from there. Luckily it wasn't too windy, otherwise I'm sure one particularly dodgy tack that left us escaping capsizing by the skin of our teeth would definitely have resulted in us going for a swim. Other than that one small mishap, I got the hang of using the wind quite well and managed to guide us over to a beach on the other side of the river for a cup of tea. Winner!

You can always rely on the Aussies to come up with a mature name for a boat

We climbed back into the cat and I let John guide us out of the little bay, mainly due to the abundance of swimming children that I didn't fancy facing the consequences of ploughing through (a few months away from the café has resulted in my hatred of the younger generation having all but faded away; no strangulation or toddler trap thoughts for quite a while Kirst!). Due to the huge number of rich people in Perth, there were tonnes of Jet skis pulling along banana boats and rubber rings, which looked like a lot of friends. When I get back home, I shall make a point of hanging around Rock trying to make friends with all the rahs. As I ducked under the mast for the last time, I knocked my sunglasses off my head and they were lost to the river. Good job they were only ASOS cheapies and not Gucci, a pair of which John found snorkelling with Jamie years ago and Vic still wears. This small loss was well worth escaping the heat on the water for a few hours, not to mention the fun I had sailing.

It must be said though, spending quality time with my temporary "Dad" brought to the front of my mind just how much I miss the old man at home in Camelford. I know he's not a sailing whizz and doesn't own a Jag, but it would bring joy to my heart to hear "that'll be a pound" over here right now. Love you Tim nice but dim!