When the Hottis invited us over to interact with the Naval Children’s School students, we decided to sail over. And the Hotti family hopped on for the ride.
Unfortunately for them, we had almost no winds throughout the sail and ended up motoring most of the way down. The flat calm seas meant the boat stayed on an even keel throughout. An unexpected benefit being a relaxing hand massage.
It felt good though to cruise into the calm Karwar base after a sultry day at sea, to a piping hot meal at the Hotti home. While we stayed at the guest house, these meals became the star feature of our trip. Mukta ensured we were well fed as we careened from lecture, to sail to trek, to sail some more.
We started the next day with an interactive session with the NCS students where they peppered Dilip with questions about his circumnavigation. Subsequently we did 3 sorties within the bay to give some of the kids a whiff of sailing on a large boat.
The base has a small fleet of Optimists and Lasers, and in the lockdown a lot of the children took to cycling and sailing; or, cycling to the beach to go sailing!
The children helped raise the main sail and learnt some basic knots. We even celebrated a birthday with cream biscuits and a countdown.
All too soon we had to make our way home. The wind gods were feeling generous this time and we sailed back at a consistent speed of 6 kts.
Sailing upwind, we had to tack a few times, closer to Bogmalo and Grande island, making it home in just over 14 hours.
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