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BLADNOCH RAFT RACE 2003

A truly international team - The Asylum Seekers - was entered by the Distillery into this year's race. Raymond and Martin from N. Ireland, Dan and Gordon from England, Donald, Livvy and Francis from Scotland with Henrik the Viking from Sweden.

The raft was a sight to behold - rowers chanting, oars splashing, flags fluttering as they hurtled from Bladnoch Bridge to Wigtown Harbour.

Please select a picture to view:

The Planning The Launch The Crew The Opposition And They're Off.. Final Furlong All Flags Flying

Raymond describes the race...........

"I'm going to keep this fairly short and simple for I don't usually make speeches. The raft race was brilliant. The crew were brilliant, Henrik with the Swedish flag flying, and wearing his Viking hat and sword on top of the mast of our raft looked brilliant, rape and pillage were obviously in his jeans ... sorry genes. The rest of the crew paddling hard, sweating hard and grunting for extra effect, whilst Donald Tam o'Shanter Kay liberally applied the Ambre Solaire and Gordon passed the cans of Tennants. I declined as I'm not sure that drinking and heavy rowing go together.
We shunned numerous opportunities to cheat prefering to steam down the river to cries of Freedom and a large crowd was amazed by our strength, speed and skill. At the finish we turned our bulky raft easily the biggest present, as if on a sixpence, into the muddy slipway taking our directions like slaves from our Viking leader.
Only one negative in the whole race, the guides reached the finish slightly ahead of us, but we generously had slowed down to give two smaller rafts, in difficulty, a tow.

We were brilliant !