Of all the yacht regatta held in this part of the world, then this is always my favourite and I'm not alone in that. It's passage racing that usually involves a route from Krabi to Phuket which takes those on board through some of the most spectacular scenery in the world. If you've never been to this part of the world, then these islands are the ones you'd see on that old James Bond movie and those usually associated with Thailand. They appear without graduation, shooting often vertically out from the ocean. You can get very close to some of these island yet still be in 20m of water (don't try it on your yacht unless your pretty sure of the depth though!).
This race is always regarded as the friendly one. It lacks the politics that often drag around with many other regattas. Most people who do it have done it before -or at least soon they will be! Thanks to John Everingham and the team from Art Asia Press, who do much of the organising. A special hello to those folk who we partied with - Rose, Kerrie, Shona,Boo, Hamish, Lies, Alice, JC's crew on Fi Tuen and of course our own crew - Mike, Lorraine, Johnny, Heath, & Gene.

The wind was pretty strong this year compared to recent years, so we all had a good workout. All in all something like 12 spinnakers blew out on the final day. One of those was ours, but some weren't even that lucky and lost 2. The won that didn't blow thankfully, was new this year and is much bigger than previous ones on TAG. This year we managed 13.7 knots on TAG! When you consider that the boat will usually race at 8 or 9 knots, then this was pretty exciting stuff.

These always the inevitable funny stories from such events. Here's just a few that I managed to write down or remember....

Flubber's big night out...
Flubber could not find his crew from JC's boat so did not know where the boat was to get back out to it after one of the partys. He ended up spending the night tucked up i na dinghy of the shore. Strange how stuff works out, because that's where JC's crew found him the next day. Pretty easy to do really, because he had unknowingly spent the night cuddled up in the dinghy belonging to Fi Tuen !! Even better- the crew had a relatively comfy night ashore - I use the word relatively loosely here - read on to find out why!...

ght I slept with JC in a massage parlour!.....
During one night, the wind had got up so much that even the longtail boats wouldn't take people out to their boats after the party. Options, options, options... I had long since lost the TAG crew, having had enough of Mike musical boats moving it round various bays without telling folk, then doing the same in the bars! It'll all work out, I promised myself (you don't know how hard that is for a control freak to think that!).

I found myself considering checking into a guest house, then suddenly one of those little alignment of stars of something happened. As I was walking past a Thai massage shop (and these are proper massage places, not the ones round the back of railway stations in the west!), the lady who ran it said, "Maybe your friend stay here...many men from boat here.... you maybe stay too... bad wind...". I'm not sure if she meant the bad wind on the shore on the bad wind from the sailors! Anyway, it's an option, I thought, so I put my head in to check it out. Lowe and behold, who should be camped down for the night on the beds but..... JC and the crew from Fi Tuen!! Hilarious. I can't believe I was in the same place. It was the best option for the night with no yacht or crew or means of finding either. I have to say, I got a great night's sleep. However, I did think I might be doing grander things in life by now than spending the night in a massage parlour with JC!
All in all a great regatta. If you want to know more about it, then visit the bay regatta website.