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Email 2001
John Burnie
From: "John Burnie"
Date: Mon, Jul 30, 2001.
Subject: OC News
Dear Nick
It is good to keep receiving all the regular OC news by email, and
congratulations to you and the team for all the hard work on the website /
communication infrastructure. I was particularly amused to see a picture
of me, J Whicher and M Rudiani leaning on the bonnet of a car in 1966!!
(This is a photo of the Pottery Club members by the way.) I do hope one of these
days to be able to attend and support some of the functions that you and your
core group put so much effort into organising.
As you know, I spend much of my free time organising a sailing team, as I am the
racing captain and helmsman on a 30 metre racing yacht. (I enclose a picture of
us at the gin and tonic end!!) We race with a crew of 35 and organising a group
of up to 50 people at a regatta I suspect is a bit like organising OC events!!
You may remember some of the racing we did together around Poole Harbour with
JDS in 1967! I clearly remember you and Spinney hard aground while Roddy
Stansfield and I sailed on to victory in the Cadet - and didn't Spinney send you
over the side to push off and then sail off without you? Callous business this
racing of yachts!
I do see any number of OC's who sail and in particular I always see Simon Vaisey
at Antigua Race Week every year. I occasionally bump into Jeremy Rogers and
Jonathan Rogers in Lymington (as well as the famous designer son Simon, not an
OC) and I often see James and Charlie Wallrock who are great characters as well
as highly competitive racing sailors.
Our team is racing in Cowes at the 150th Jubilee of The America's Cup in August
and I am sure I will see any number of OC's there including the Bradbeers. What
a great regatta that will be, do you fancy coming over?! One lesser spotted OC I
hope to have on board for at least one race as a guest is Gerry Stonhill,
landlord of the finest pub in Southern England, The Masons Arms in South Leigh.
Michael Winner reviewed the pub (Sunday Times) and hated it because everything
about the pub was more interesting and unique than Michael Winner!
After the Jubilee our racing team will then attend the late Mediterranean yacht
racing season, basing from St Tropez and participating in the "Nioularge"
now renamed "Les Voiles de St Tropez." Fancy coming on that one?
I wish you all the best with your Choral endeavours at the school which sadly
again I will not be able to attend. I can still do bit of harmony by the way,
though this is less in the way of The Salisbury Cathedral/Figaro type refrain
(remember all that?)- its more in the way of post Mount Gay Rum Party "We
came on the Sloop John B" stanza. You may be interested to know that my
experience and training as a tenor in your choir has guaranteed my place in life
in the front row of "maudlin post regatta victory celebration/wake." I
have from time to time offered to play my bassoon at these occasions but oddly
enough this instrument is yet to established its reputation as a crowd pleaser
on the racing circuit.
All the Best for Now.
John Burnie (66-71)
