The Festival of Sails, the southern hemisphere's largest annual keelboat regatta, will soon be upon us! Taking place along Victoria's Geelong coast from Friday 26 January to Sunday 28 January, the event will see world-class sailors from around the globe compete for trophies and division places in a host of sailing events, with a heap of family-friendly shoreside entertainment for seafarers and landlubbers of any age. 

But the million-dollar question is: What's the weather going to be like? 

Well, luckily for attendees, the dreariest weather looks to be on Wednesday and Thursday with a front-reinforced trough looking to cross the country's southeast. However, cooling cloud cover and gusty southeasterly winds look to cap temperatures in the low 20s. 

As for the sailors, the winds will be blowing! West-south-westerlies and southwesterly winds look to stay above 10 knots (18km/h)throughout Friday and Saturday, with it being particularly gusty on Friday (gusts exceeding 27knots (50km/h), see Fig.1). Consequently, we can expect some 2m plus waves within the bay on the 26th. 

Fig.1) (Upper) Sustained winds & (Lower) wind gusts expected at 3:00pm AED on Fri 26th Jan 2024. 

The good news is that weather looks to calm throughout the course of the event, with skies clearing out and winds easing on Sunday the 28th Jan. 

Best of luck to all our sailors this coming weekend!