Two of the SAMM Groups, Balaton and Shoestring, enjoyed a fun sail-meal-sail on June 23rd, organised by Balaton Group leader Julian Pering as part of the SAMM Social calender.
Two Shoestring boats Uno and Cuatro and three Balaton boats started from their base at CAR, Los Narejos on the Mar Menor at 10:30 with the SAMM support boat, crewed by Martin and Norman, following along; all heading for the La Playa restaurant at Los Urrutias. Some wives and other members were to meet them there.
Two of the Balaton Groups Russian members we’re sailing Sirocco with new Swedish member Nils. Vision was crewed by their German member Jurgen with Jez and guest Shelley, Ginetta by Julian with Colum and Laura.
The five boats sailed through the gap between Pediguera and Baron islands on a south easterly breeze then turned West towards Los Urrutias. Well most did! For some reason Jez was convinced that Los Urrutias was further down the coast and instead of following the other four boats decided to sail on South. Once they realised the mistake they put away their sails and motored in order to catch up.
The Shoestring dinghies put into the beach adjacent to one of the new jetties while the Balaton boats anchored offshore due to the shallow water.
Everybody had an excellent menu del dia At La Playa restaurant with 22 people from SAMM attending. After lunch Julian accepted the “Parrot” (a prize for a Balaton member who messes up) from Sergey for the mistake of not putting Visions keel down at the start of the last race day. However, he was pleased to immediately pass this to Jurgen and Jez for heading in the wrong direction this morning.
Over lunch Colum and Laura asked if they could join the Balaton Group and have since done so.
The dinghies were able to get quickly away once the lunch was over and the Whaly gave the crews a taxi ride out to the Balaton boats. As requested by Martin, Julian helped push the Whaly off the jetty and, as a reward, was soaked to the skin by the prop wash when Martin deliberately revved the engine. Unfortunately no video of this ambush.
On the way back the boats had a lovely beam reach sail in a decent breeze. Sirocco decided to take a route to far to the east the crew not knowing they should steer for the blue building which shows where to head to get back to CAR. Jules phoned to get them back on track and they were not far behind, coming in fast on the good breeze.
