RIO DE JANEIRO
2016 OLYMPIC / PARALYMPIC GAMES
CLUB YACHTING
Rio de Janeiro or January River in English , is the venue for the 2016 Olympic and Paralympic Games . Liesl and I are here training for three weeks exactly one year before the games to start to get a feel for the conditions before the big event . What a complicated venue to sail in !
Our course will be set in Guanabara Bay but because of the large water mass inland it behaves like a large river but with huge tide movements in all directions . It is surrounded by 700m tall mountains that stop any true wind coming in except for a small opening at the river mouth that lets a weak seabreeze in sometimes .
On a land breeze day , a continuous stream of jet aircraft fly low over the water to land at the domestic airport next to the marina . The planes fly so low that the jet wash from them can knock over your boat with a nice autotack . They say they will stop this for the Olympics but not the Paralympics so it will add another layer of complexity for us .
And now the pollution . It is worse than you imagine . The water in the Olympic marina is putrid with raw sewage . An untreated sewer drains directly into it leaving the water black , dead , stinking and with human waste floating in it . On a tow out to training one day we got a surprise when one of the many condoms in the water hooked onto our towrope and wouldn ’ t come off ! The water in the race area is no better because it now contains rubbish , plastic bags , vegetation and dead animals .
Two days ago we went up Sugarloaf Mountain to get a look over the city . From up there Rio is the most spectacular city in the world with its bald mountains , green valleys and white beaches . It ’ s only at ground level when you smell the truth that all is not good .
This experience makes me realise how lucky we are to have pristine Pittwater and the RPAYC . In Marina de Gloria there are many massive multimillion dollar yachts moored there with white gleaming topsides but they are floating in sewage ..... I think we are doing pretty well in our little club down there on the Northern Beaches .
BY DAN FITZGIBBON
Dan and Liesl ( image top right ) will be in action at the 2016 Paralympic games in Rio from September 7 – 18 2016 .
32 YACHTSMAN