Force 3? Maybe 4? Perhaps even a Fresh Breeze?

I went sailing in the Harbour again. The captain's plan was to have a go at setting the spinnaker as practice for racing. There was a race going on as we embarked - these crews had a serious air about them and we stayed out of their way.
Here's an old but pretty boat.
After taking some pics in the marina I put the camera away as the water was quite choppy and the wind was really blowing (30 knots at times? this mean anything to anyone?) Force 4? Perhaps even Force 5? Well, I have no idea. Check out the Beaufort Scale. I did get it back out for the following sign on the bridge:
Fantastic! Only in NZ!

The sailing was rough and a bit nerve wracking at times (water over the railing? not a problem apparently...). We never even attempted to put up the spinnaker. With experience I'm sure these conditions are nothing. With my lack of experience there comes a bit of clarity. I don't really have to think about what to do (my job, hauling in the sheets, is simple) and so I am freed up to think about exactly when one might decide to swim for it. It seems that the answer is practically never. The captain later described what one might do in the case that the main sail goes all the way over into the water (hold on, release the main, and viola! count the crew!)

Back in the slip a story was told about a boat that returned from a recent race up the coast (started on Friday, a fast catamaran took 10 hrs to run 120 nautical miles, most took twice that). This boat was hit by a gust, it went sails into the water, the captain released the main and the boat went back down, all was well. The crew member we talked with remarked that he was impressed with the cleanliness of the bottom of the boat, which he calmly observed while 3m in the air above a horizontal boat.