The Celtic Longboat
This was supposed to be posted on May 18th, but I've just realised I failed to copy it over from DW, so here it is copied and backdated rather late.
Someone I know via a swimming group is also a rower in a Celtic Longboat team who was planning to take part in the Cardigan Bay Challenge, a row across from the south pointy bit of Wales (Fishguard, to be precise) to the north pointy bit (Pwllheli). To do this, each rowing team needs a support yacht and a RIB capable of carrying the rowing team and towing the longboat if necessary. We have a suitable RIB, so we volunteered to help out.
Sadly, my friend then had to drop out due to an injury, but we thought it sounded like an interesting challenge so we volunteered to take part anyway. Yesterday we met up with the crew, and also another more experienced crew who had volunteered to help the novices practice, for a session in the relatively safe waters of the middle Cleddau, swapping teams on and off the Celtic and the RIB. We had fun and nobody fell in, so I'm counting that a win.
It will be something like a 10-hour row, with two teams swapping at one, or maybe one-and-a-half hour intervals, setting off at 6pm and rowing overnight. (Nobody seems to be quite sure why it's an overnight row, which does seem like it's complicating matters. But this is as the small gods of Welsh Rowing have dictated.)
I am not sure this is actually going to happen. It's extremely weather-dependent (only happens if the winds forecast are force 3 or less), and also our team currently seems to have a bit of a case of Schroedinger's Yacht, and we can't do the journey without the yacht.
We shall see. I have asked a local friend if she would dogsit for me if necessary for that weekend: she has had a whole series of adopted sighthounds through the years, and Rosie knows her, so hopefully that will work if everything else does come together. In the meanwhile, we are off for another practice next week, this time down at Dale, which will allow us, and more importantly the rowers, to train on the sea.