Wanted to let you all know about our latest "great adventure". This past weekend 5 America's Cup boats held races on S.F.Bay so we went over from Richmond to see them. The one race on Friday was kind of a bust as the winds died just after the start and Oracle beat the others by at least an hour [Oracle being the only new boat with the four others from 1992]. After resting and a short sail on Saturday we went back over on Sunday to watch the second race of the day as the currents and an early start for the first race of the day would be hard to get to. We reached across to Paradise Cove with 120 jib and one reef in the main, cruised the fleet at anchor- saw some absolute beauties- put in the second reef and reduced the jib to about 80%- gotta love that CDI furler!- and beat on up Raccoon Strait to the Corinthian YC. There were lots of boats out, all bigger than us, but no America's Cup boats- found out they called the second race of the day due to high winds of about 20-25 knots! Kind of chicken of them but then again the crews had not had a lot of practice under those conditions. We were doing great and "hula pie" was standing up real nice so we continued on around the southern end of the island and into the Slot. It was wind against a still ebbing current and the following waves were about 4 feet- Cat kept saying 'DON'T LOOK BACK' !!! After a few waves my old surfing days came back to me and I remembered how you take off square with the wave then turn so we were doing that for about 20 minutes on the way back to Richmond. Got some really nice rides, Man, that was a lot of FUN!!! Thanks to Lyle Hess and Jerry Montgomery for such a fun and seaworthy boat. If anyone would like to join us for a cruise let's go. Richmond has a great launch ramp and lots of sailing options. Ron and Cathryn Goodspeed M17 "hula pie" #025