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The 10th Pattaya Mail PC Classic Royal Cliff Beach Resort International Regatta (pwhew!!!) took place on Saturday May 8th this year at The Royal Varuna Yacht Club in Pattaya.
Just to fill in some of the background to this event, PC stands for Peter Cummins, a noted Pattaya celebrity of many years standing, and not only standing but also sitting in yachts, and was from 1979 to 1980 the Yacht Club’s 10th Flag Commodore.
At the inaugural event in 1995, Peter reached the ripe old age of 60 (happens to us all) and was awarded life membership of the club, and to commemorate this a ‘modest’ yacht race was held, and this has been repeated each and every year since then, but nowadays with sponsorship from Pattaya Mail (for whom Peter still occasionally writes as a special correspondent) and The Royal Cliff Beach Resort, one of the Royal Cliff Hotels the event has become one of the ‘must attend’ events on the Pattaya Social Calendar.
Having said that, this was actually the first year that The Pattaya Otter was in attendance (can’t remember why I wasn’t there last year) and was also his first sight of The Royal Varuna Yacht Club.
As you may have read in a prior article, earlier this year I was invited to the Ocean Marina Regatta held at their club someway down the coast. For that, somewhat unprepared for the grandeur on display, and having been informed that we were going out in a motor boat to cover the event, I arrived dressed for getting wet, i.e. old ‘T’ shirt, old tatty shorts and a pair of flip-flops, only to find myself boarding this luxury cabin cruiser from the comfort of the marina dock with my fellow guests all decked out in their best yachting whites.
So, assuming something similar this time, I arrived dressed in smart pristine white shirt and shorts plus best non slip white pumps.
On my first sighting of the Royal Varuna Yacht Club, I enquired where the marina was, to be told they didn’t have one, and in fact the only premises available was a very modest club house with a new much more splendid one under construction behind.
I had previously been informed that the boat we were to be taken out on was somewhat smaller than the previous cabin cruiser, but I was still somewhat unprepared for what looked like an upturned bath tub complete with outboard motor that was presented to me as our sole means of transport on the water.
Another contrast was the water itself, for the previous event the problem was not enough wind and the sea was flat calm. This time a gusty wind was swirling around, increasing each time one of the squally showers blew up and whipping up what looked like quite a rough sea.
It then became apparent that the only way to actually board this craft was to wade out in the choppy water until about waist deep and then, whilst trying to avoid stepping on the razor sharp rocks below the surface, try to do a somersault into the stern. Fortuitously I had already stowed my camera equipment in a bag on a shelf in the bows as it would not otherwise have survived the boarding procedure.
 Eventually, drenched to the skin, all 4 of us were hauled aboard and we set out to take some pictures of the yachts already sailing around the starting boat. This was in fact the Royal Cliff Catamaran which had been on offer as an alternative means of viewing the event (we declined taking the view that it was too static and not close enough to the action – static being an epithet that could  most certainly not be applied to our current craft).
Bouncing over the waves, sometimes through the waves and occasionally under the waves we headed out to sea and when we came within picture distance of some of the yachts, attempted to take some photos. There was a twofold problem to this, one being the bucking boat and the other trying to keep the camera and the breaking waves apart, but in spite of this we did manage some reasonable shots.
However as conditions seemed to worsen, and as we discovered that someone had forgotten to pack any life jackets, we eventually decided we had taken enough and so returned to shore to watch the rest of the day’s proceedings from the relative comfort of the inevitable beer tent there.
And not just a beer tent but a veritable alley of food and beverage stalls all compliments of the event’s sponsors.
So standing with arms and legs akimbo as we tried to dry ourselves in the wind, we drank and chewed and also chatted with lots of friends that had arrived whilst we were enduring our rigours, so much so that interest in what was taking place on the water waned in proportion to the waxing of the beer. We did hear rumours that some of the junior events had been cancelled due to the conditions but this did not seem to have stopped the youngsters taking to the water as later we witnessed them all coming ashore, accompanied by a marching band.
Once all were safely back on shore, we then all adjourned home to change prior to reassembling at the Royal Cliff Beach Resort Poolside for a gala buffet dinner and prize giving.
For this the hotel had really gone to town with a large stage at one end of the pool for the presentations, a band stage next to it, and surrounding the remainder of the poolside grounds, stall after stall offering foods of many different tastes and styles (this was not all free by the way but a large proportion of the modest ticket price was donated to charity). 
To entertain us whilst we ate we had a selection of singers, musicians and also a large children’s group from several Pattaya schools demonstrating their skill in synchronised movement.
After this came the prize giving with prizes for the various classes of yachts taking part including catamarans, Lasers and the junior Optimist dinghies (so they weren’t cancelled after all). PC himself did most of the presenting.
The evenings proceedings concluded with the drawing of the winners of the prize raffle with the top prize being a ticket to Singapore courtesy of Swiss Air - they didn’t say if it was one way or return, and no the Pattaya Otter didn’t win it – nor indeed anything else, but nevertheless enjoyed what had been a long but worthwhile day out.
To view any of the above photos in full size, just click on it.
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