Cuttyhunk is a small island at the the tip of the Elizabeth Islands on the eastern side of Buzzards’ Bay in southeastern Massachusetts. It is a town time has forgotten (except for the 50 moorings in the harbor and all the cruising vessels moored there). Sort of like Brigadoon. Lobster rolls and clam chowder at the shacks dockside, gray shingled old homes along the few streets in the town center, and lots of preserved land. Lots of sea and sky. Wind, too.

A ferry from New Bedford comes once a day in the morning delivering supplies and a few people. It is a great day trip. And a fun and strange and endearing tradition is alive and well….jumping into the water to say farewell each time the ferry departs. Kids, adults, all are welcomed to assemble at the dock to jump. There can be a gaggle of 20 people of all ages doing the Jump for any given departure. An odd way to say goodbye, hope you had fun, but, I guess, a way of jumping for joy.

Sue and I sailing our SS30 bumped into Dejan Radeka and Mary Pat Radeka sailing their SS30 with his daughter and her boyfriend 2 days ago at Cuttyhunk. As the ferry left, our erstwhile Sea Sprite website Forum guru continued the tradition, waving goodbye as he plunged into the waters…

Here he is in mid-flight…

He did survive. He is a big guy, and made quite splash. He was not arrested for his wake (see sign).

I welcome your stories of travel or racing or day sailing in all vessels sea sprite. Describe your time in an email, attach some pictures, and send the email to me at seaspriteassociation@gmail.com. I will write up a post.

Fair winds, everyone!

Carter

2021 Sea Sprite One-Design Regatta

The Bristol Yacht Club hosted the 2021 Sea Sprite Regatta on July 24.  Race Committee Chair Joe Jablonowski and PRO Roger Carney with support from volunteer Bruce Nourie set inflatable marks for windward-leeward courses.  Two races were held with perennial hotshot Bob Catani winning both races with a total score of 1.5 points.  Second place went to BYC member Bob Rude and third place went to Sea Sprite Commodore and soon-to-be BYC member Dom Messerli.

It was a beautiful Narragansett sailing day with the first race started in light air and then building into a perfect 12 knot southwesterly.  The racing was close with the highlight being Dom Messerli’s New Hope beating Bob Rude’s Apsaras across the finish line by less than a foot after dueling throughout the downwind leg.

   

The finishers in order with their BYC affiliation marked as follows:

1 – Bob Catani – Bramasole – BYC

2 – Bob Rude – Apsaras – BYC

3 – Dom Messerli – New Hope – BYC

4 – Mark Rotsky – Oasis – BYC

5 – Ray Renaud – Fur Elise – BYC

6 – Jerry De Rham – Swallow – Unaffiliated 

7 – Andrew MacKeith – Vexatious – BYC

7 – Evan Ide – Phox – American Yacht Club

9 – Joe Picard – Destiny – Team Destiny

DNF – Bella Infante – Grayling – Herreshoff Sailing Club

After the regatta, a pizza party and awards dinner for sailors, crew, and their families was held by the beautiful fire pit on the grounds of the BYC.  Innumerable episodes from the race course were shared and lessons learned from the day were bandied about. A shout-out for organizing another great Sea Sprite Regatta goes to Bristol YC for hosting, the race officers Joe and Roger for officiating, Bruce for helping set the courses, and our own Fleet Commodore Dom and able assistant Bob Rude for organizing and coordinating.

The next big regatta for Sea Sprite sailors will be the September 11 Race Around Hog Island, always a low-key fun event.  Buy a Sea Sprite and join the fun!  As one visiting yachtsman said, “You can’t sail across Bristol Harbor without bumping into one of those beautiful little Sea Sprites!”

It should be Spring, but it isn’t. No boat to work on yet. So I dug out some old brochures from the SSA archives (an almost forgotten bin in my basement), took pictures of them, and strung them together to tell the story of the sea sprite line of boats. The picture quality is adequate (you can read most everything), and the story is fun to follow from the brochures. I also added an oral history thread from the Forum of 2007, threw in a couple of obits, and maybe a couple of pithy comments. If you have nothing else to do……..

http://www.seaspriteassociation.com/history/the-sea-sprite-sailboat-history/