Olympic Adventures: A little Weymouth and Portland history...

As I previously mentioned, this is my second trip to Weymouth. I was hear about 5 weeks ago for the Sail For Gold Regatta which most countries used as a tune up event leading into the Games. The weather during that time SUCKED. It was typical English weather- chilly and rainy. One of the days the videographer, Dan Eagan, took me out on his boat to view from the water. It was honestly the nastiest day possible but a great opportunity to learn about the sport from another perspective so not to be passed up. Dan was awesome. A professional skier who learned from and worked with Warren Miller early on. Dan films primarily sailing and skiing and is a cool dude from New Hampshire (or maybe Vermont). Anyways... grey, wet, windy afternoon... staff lent me their sailing gear to include boots, bibs and jacket. Thank goodness as I was soaked from the get go. It was the second to last day of racing and we were zipping around to each of the courses catching a glimpse of all the classes. We were working out way further and further out into the open water therefore the swells were a little bigger. I'll cut to the chase... I yakked. I was starting to feel not so good early on but my pride got the best of me and I wanted to earn my sailing anchor (equivalent of airplane wings???). Probably 1.5 hours after being out there I couldn't fight it any longer... lost my breakfast... my eggs and salsa... not a good feeling. Dan kept asking, wanna go in, wanna go in... heck no!!! After about the 5th time of him asking which was usually followed with me puking yet again, I finally surrendered and we headed in. Good times.

So back to Weymouth and Portland fun facts... so Weymouth is a resort town on the southwest coast of England. It's a 3 hour train ride from Waterloo Station. Apparently a frequented tourist location during summer holiday. As I have mentioned Portland is on the Island just across a 1 mile causeway from Weymouth. Originally the only thing that connect the two was Chesil Beach aka the Jurassic Coast which is the longest pebble beach in the world at 13 miles. Feel free to call me out if my facts are wrong. Weymouth was the largest naval base until about 1996. It was the location of the largest embankment of Allied forces for Normandy during WWII. Portland boasts the world famous Portland Stone that has been used in structures such as St. Paul's Cathedral, Buckingham Palace and even the White House. There are many quarries over the 2 X 5 mile island that is said to have 40 years of quarrying left. Fun local story about that... we have been told by that it is unlucky to say the word "rabbit". People on the Isle of Portland (where we are staying) do not like rabbits because supposedly back in the day if the quarries were going to collapse all the rabbits would sense it and run out. So do not say rabbit in Portland or you may not be served your pint.