Taka Trois going through her paces off the coast of Anguilla
When I wrote my last post at the beginning of this year, I hoped that I would be regularly writing new ‘takadventures.‘ However, what really happened was not very adventurous; work, work, work, a series of visitors, very little sailing and, as the French say, les petites choses de la vie (the little things in life), none of which make for very interesting reading. The month of March however, brought an exciting event worth writing about: The Heineken regatta.
This event is is known as one of the “must do” events in the Caribbean and has more than 200 boats from over a dozen countries competing in four days of racing. Patrice has been dying to participate (he refuses to tell me how long he has been dreaming of this, but I suspect it was around the time we acquired ‘Taka’ our first boat back in the year 2000 or perhaps even farther back to the time of his birth...).
For a very brief period of time in the early days of our sailing history, Patrice and I tried our hand at racing together with the yacht club in Courseulles, Patrice’s home town in Normandy on Taka (One), a 22 foot Jeanneau. We came in last in the first regatta we entered (and we have the trophy to prove it) and things went downhill from there. We rarely finished most races and in one case we didn’t even manage to cross the start line--pathetic! During the final regatta of our career, when we foolishly tried to use our newly acquired spinnaker--a last ditch attempt to save face--we nearly killed each other.
Just to clarify, friends and neighbors, this has very little to do with sailing skill, although specific racing experience does help. Patrice is an accomplished skipper and I’m not totally clueless as a crew member, but this is about competition and there is something about men and boats and competition that very seldom mixes well in a marriage.
Just to clarify, friends and neighbors, this has very little to do with sailing skill, although specific racing experience does help. Patrice is an accomplished skipper and I’m not totally clueless as a crew member, but this is about competition and there is something about men and boats and competition that very seldom mixes well in a marriage.
In the midst of that fateful last race, when we had stopped shouting at each other momentarily, I looked around me and noticed something interesting about the participants. The conversation which followed went something like this:
Debbie: “Patrice...”
Patrice: “Yeah.”
Debbie: “Do you see any other married couples out here racing?”
Patrice: “ .............errrr, no.”
Debbie: “THERE’S A REASON FOR THAT!”
So, we wisely decided, for the sake of our marriage and sanity, to put an end to the madness. I encouraged Patrice to continue without me, but his heart wasn’t in it (bless him) and with the exception of a one-off race on Taka Trois many years later in La Rochelle with Mathieu and Ian, our semi-professional sailing friends in charge (see below), we never raced again.
Debbie: “Patrice...”
Patrice: “Yeah.”
Debbie: “Do you see any other married couples out here racing?”
Patrice: “ .............errrr, no.”
Debbie: “THERE’S A REASON FOR THAT!”
So, we wisely decided, for the sake of our marriage and sanity, to put an end to the madness. I encouraged Patrice to continue without me, but his heart wasn’t in it (bless him) and with the exception of a one-off race on Taka Trois many years later in La Rochelle with Mathieu and Ian, our semi-professional sailing friends in charge (see below), we never raced again.
Matthieu and Ian took care of Taka Trois in La Rochelle while we were in Trinidad and helped us prepare for our sabbatical year journey and crossing. They love Taka Trois and were dying for the opportunity to put her through her paces during the big annual local race around the nearby Ile de Ré. We were so grateful to them for their help and knowing Taka Trois would be in capable hands, I agreed, as long as they would be in charge and we would be just crew. Although the day was wet and cold, the experience was not unpleasant and we came in 4th out of 99 in real time (61 with an unfortunate and possibly erroneous handicap adjustment).
Last March we watched the Heineken regatta from afar and I could tell that Patrice’s antennae were starting to quiver. I mentally prepared a long list of reasons to squash what I knew was coming (“Remember our racing history? We become screaming meanies! Taka Trois is our home! Those guys look very very serious and scary!”) and launched all of it and more at the first mention of the idea of competing.
A frenzy of boats whiz past us last year during the Heineken regatta
Two months later, our good friends Bert and Judith came to sail with us. During their stay, it became apparent that Bert is not only an exceptional sailor and helmsman, but has considerable experience racing. He is also, and here’s the clincher, one of the kindest, calmest people I know, even when sailing in difficult conditions, some of which we encountered during their stay. Patrice and Bert talked endlessly about the Heineken that week, to the point where I realized how much Patrice was dreaming about it and in a moment of insanity (and there must’ve been rum involved) I said, “well, if Bert does it with us, why not?”
Those words, of course, were like waving the proverbial 'red flag to a bull.' The end of the story will be in my next post coming shortly.
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