Feb. 12, 2008 - Langkawi International Regatta
by Beth & Al Liggett

In 2003 the very first Royal Langkawi International Regatta was held. Over 60 boats participated and SUNFLOWER was one of them. We did not do well at all, placing seventh in a field of nine other cruising boats. Well, what can I say – we are not a racing boat! But we did have a good time, met interesting people, and made a whole bunch of new friends. The Regatta has been held each year since then, but we have been out to Chagos, or the Andaman Islands, or busy with boat projects and did not participate in any of them.

Langkawi Regatta poster for 2006

This year the Regatta was held early in January. We had been to Thailand, done the haul-out there, and were back in Langkawi to have Christmas with our friends. We are still not a racing boat, but decided to participate this year anyway – as volunteers! The Royal Langkawi Yacht Club is a good venue with excellent facilities and a competent staff. Still, there are so many facets to running a regatta this size that more people need to lend a hand for the event - especially people who have boating and sailing knowledge. Fortunately, the RLYC knows it has a good group of experienced people among the cruising yachts, many of whom are already right on site at the RLYC docks!

View from YC deck of the mark boats and their big inflatable marks.

Meetings began for the volunteers on Friday, the 3rd of January. Saturday was a race committee seminar, and again on Sunday, primarily to get the gear and the marker boats ready, and do a practice race with whatever boats chose to go out and practice. Al was assigned to be the navigator on the Start Boat, working along with the Principal Race Officer (PRO) and other Officials of the Race Committee. The Start Boat was a big Marine Police boat - so there was plenty of shade, a good platform on the bridge deck for viewing the course with good visibility all around, and a crew to handle the boat and anchoring.

As navigator it was Al's responsibility to help the committee set up the race courses, depending on that day's racing location and the wind direction. He took the GPS position of the Start Boat, and would then direct the mark boats to their places with GPS coordinates. Then they would set the mark buoys for the course. Al also got to push the button that sounded the horn for the start of the races and again for the first to finish in each class!

More race Committee workers on the Start Boat: Erja, a volunteer who recorded and did wind speed and direction; Mr. Ting Kuo from Taiwan, the official timer; and John, another volunteer recorder.

I volunteered for duty with the "Langkawi Eagle" - the daily news sheet of the Langkawi Regatta. The editor was from Kuala Lumpur. Geetha is a freelance writer who happens to be a friend of the YC manager's wife. Geetha had it all in hand with the computer side of things, but didn't know anything about boats or racing! Also reporting were 3 other volunteers who wrote for the "Eagle" last year. Richard was on the Start Boat and did the actual race reporting. Graham and Tom were roving reporters. I was also a roving reporter - I interviewed people and took assignments for writing bits of this and that from the editor. Five issues were printed, one for each of the racing days. Boy – what a scramble to get all the articles in by the 6pm deadline! It was usually the race results that were the hold up, however. Go to the Regatta web site and you can see some of the editions of the "Eagle". (www.langkawiregatta.com)

Al on the job as navigator on the Start Boat.

The RLYC offers an attractive package to their volunteers: Free berthing for 11 days at the YC (for us that's equal to about $170) and all meals provided by the club for 9 days. Breakfast we only did once; the food is not what we usually eat for breakfast, plus the meal just took too long to do - Al had to be ready on the Start Boat before 8am. He and all the volunteers out on the water were given box lunches - of questionable quality and definitely repetitive.

However, we workers on shore had a very good buffet lunch, as well as morning and afternoon tea if we were so inclined. Then there was dinner all those nights as well - either at the parties of prize giving and dinner for all the racers, or a nice buffet diner for the volunteers at the club, only one of which was a fizzle. And I must say that of the four big party meals, the two dinners at the YC were far superior to the two that were held at local hotels. Then of course there were the T-shirts and caps and such given to each volunteer.

One of the crew members on TWIN SHARKS, a fast Fire Fly catamaran from Phuket, Thailand. They all wore pink tutus for the race!

As it was, there were good winds for the first two days of the Regatta, with the races held right in the waters of Bass Harbor. On Wednesday the courses were set outside the confines of the islands. Currents were strongly running across the course, and the winds were more problematical. In fact, the second race on that day was called off because some of the starters (the last of the seven classes) didn't even have enough wind to make it across the start line! So the last two racing days had the courses back in Bass Harbor again. There were light winds, and the racing was close enough to home to be able to see the boats from the shore - or at least from the balcony of the YC!

Al and Beth disco the night away at the final prize-giving party at the Yacht Club.

All in all the entire Regatta went off very well. The racers grumbled about the wind – but then, don't they always? (The following week there was NO wind at all!) There were no catastrophes out on the water and even the few protests more or less resolved themselves. Al and I had a chance to do something different – if a bit intense. Gosh – it was like going to WORK every day! And again, we met interesting people, renewed old acquaintances and made new friends too.

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