Sailing by Addie

I'm so sorry I have not posted a blog in a long time. It's been really busy here, especially when we were sailing. The sailing has been really fun and interesting!! I love it!! If you keep reading then you can find out more!

Sailing The Optimist

So you know we started sailing. It's been great and we really love it!  We use these boats called optimists. To use them you steer with the tiller which is attached to the rudder. Plus, you have to keep pulling in the main sheet to go faster or slower. You are supposed to put the dagger board down in deep water and put it up in shallow water so it does not hit the ground. This diagram will help you.

                                                                                 

The Regatta

  In the sailing club you have a regatta. It's when all of the sailing clubs in Belize get together and have a big race called the regatta. It is really cool!! I really like it!! Anyways, the coaches can pick as many people as they want from their team to be in the regatta. The kids have to get a boat out in the morning at 7:30 and sail it to the beach to get ready for the race. First they have a meeting and see what the course is. Then they get breakfast and get their boats ready. This year my friend Olivia is sailing in it and a lot of other kids that their names would be too long to list right now. So the regatta is really long.  It is two days long. The first day takes 5 hours and 5 races.  Then on the second day it was 2 hours long and there were 2 races. After the regatta there were the award ceremonies and of course San Pedro wins because they practice every day and have pro coach. Well maybe some day I will be in the regatta and I will write about it!!!!

  

The Big Boat

That is me steering

So about 3 days ago Mr. Paul, the sailing coach, asked us if we would want to go on his big boat with him and we said yes. We were supposed to go on Friday but it rained :( ... ok, thats all.  We did not get to go...bye.

I'm just kidding.  If you fell for that I'm sorry but this is more interesting. So we decided to go on monday instead. It was a long weekend because I was so excited. Anyways, I woke up really early this morning even if we didn't have to. We packed up a lot of food and left the house. When we got to the boat it was really big and had really big sails. It was called a trimaran which is like a catamaran.  The boat had a little cabin and it had two seats in the back and that was where you steer.   It also had two little bench like things in the front of the boat.  We set sail and headed for an island.  While we were heading there Mr. Paul asked if I wanted to steer, so I steered the boat about half of the way.  It was way cooler than sailing one of the optys.  When we got to the Caye we got out and started to snorkel.  We saw lots of star fish and big angel fish.  There were lots of coral where we were and I really loved snorkeling there.

After that we swam to the island and looked around.  I saw a humungous iguana and saw an old man who lived on the island canoeing in an old row boat up to his island. We said hi and talked to him for awhile. He was really interesting and said he has lived on the island for 55 years and raised 3 children there. After, we swam back to the boat and had lunch and I got to sail back home. I had a really great time and maybe will go again some day!!

- Addie