Marvelous Margaritas

The infamous "island" prepares to dispense beer to passing racers.

Bimi shows off some tropical sails.

Galina enjoys the sunshine.

Randy says "Why are you taking my picture?"

An Artful self-portrait.

Michael and John sport tropical shirts while Daniel makes do with Bermuda shorts.

The floating “island” was out dispensing (almost) cold beer as usual for the Tropical Night Duck Dodge. Full Moon crew Art “Salsa” Teller, Michael “Parrothead” Medina, Randy “Sensei” Olsen, Galina “Grasshopper” Gordeeva, Daniel “Super Soaker” Mengedoht, and skipper John “Big Cup” Mengedoht went for a port tack start and managed to find a clear lane and fairly straight shot to the Freeway buoy.

The rounding was crowded and Full Moon had to work hard not to rear-end the T-bird Zoe while holding off a group of boats charging up from behind. The second leg to the AGC buoy was a very tight reach and Full Moon elected to stick with the jib rather than try to keep a spinnaker flying on the ragged edge of control. This was probably wise as the boats under spinnaker (of similar size) were no faster.

The second lap was fairly uneventful except for constant trading places with assorted T-birds. The wind angle was slightly lower for the reaching leg so the mighty Equalizer was deployed to good advantage, though the spinnaker pole still spent the whole time right on the forestay. In the end, Full Moon was a very respectable 8th. Caroline “Coconuts” Sneed beckoned Full Moon to join the post-race raft up but it was time to pour some cold margaritas and enjoy sailing around for yet another spectacular evening.