Sailors from the Chesapeake Hunter Sailing Associations, Northern Star HSA and HSA Station One celebrated Summer Sailstice with Happy Hour (actually, several hours) and a raft up in Eagles Cove, on the Magothy River. Reports of bad weather kept some boats away but the hardy souls who set forth on Saturday morning were well rewarded. As the day progressed they even rounded up a few additional sailors who were no doubt lured over by the party, and of course the matching, blue Summer Sailstice shirts.
"The first weekend of the summer was forecasted to be like so many of the weekends this spring – damp and dreary. More than half of the 15-or-so boats that planned to be at the joint NSHSA/HSA1 Summer Sailstice Raft-Up believed the forecast. After a drenching, blustery Friday, Saturday dawned gloomy but there was only one batch of nasty weather on the radar, so the raft was on.
By mid-morning the skies were nicer, with a light northerly breeze. Somehow, we clocked a 7-knot puff, although most of the morning was under two knots. Five Hunter Club boats, Elsie’s Phantasie, Pau Hana, Stargazer, Windrose and Jibberish, rafted together. Hunters Off the Charts and Mosella dinghied over to join us. The sun even came out and shone on us for happy hour!
We had blue International Summer Sailstice shirts and posed on the bow of Elsie’s Phantasie for a photo by Stargazer’s drone. Since the little drone is technically a “quad-rotor helicopter” we can now boast that we have a boat in our fleet with a helo pad."
Clearly all sailboats should have a helo pad!
After a relaxing night on the water, the Hunter sailors were awarded more good weather on the Sunday and enjoyed a leisurely cruise home.
