06 August 2022 – Saturday – The CCA Gala Dinner at RNYC

The only planned event for our last day was a gala dinner. The yacht club has a tent that they use for many events and all our dinners were there. We could already see that they had gotten the place dressed up for the party.

We decided to take a walk around St John’s in the afternoon. There is a several block area which is closed off to traffic so that stores and street areas are easily accessible. We poked in and out of stores, bought a few souvenirs, and ate ice cream. We also had plans to visit a private club that had been a naval officer’s club during the first and second world wars. It was named The Crow’s Nest. One of the yacht club members had connections that got us a private entry into the old building. It was a funny old building with lots of history. Many things have changed over the years including allowing women to be members. We were given a talk about many of the placards hanging on the walls which were from many boats and ships that had been part of the war effort. St John’s had been a major staging area for ships coming to and from Europe.

We returned to the yacht club to get ready for the party. When we stepped onto the dock we were greeted by pirates! They were the official greeters for the party. The pirates served bubbly to everyone for a toast. Then we had a delicious dinner with wine. It was a great way to end our adventure. Several of the boats planned to leave on Sunday. We had 2 more crew arriving so we planned for a Monday departure. The winds were predicted to be strong and against the boats on Sunday anyway so we were happy to spend another day in port. It gave us time to clean the boat and provision again as well.