Well I had some spare time so I sanded down the varnish (a bit), used varnish thinner, then scrubbed it with Ammonia & water. This time when I put on a coat thinned about 10% it dried beautifully.

So the lesson here is that I will not thin the varnish as much and I will ALWAYS wash epoxy with ammonia before varnishing!

Thanks to everyone who replied...this is an incredibly active and helpful forum!!!!!!!

: Thanks all for the responses. It's nice to know that I'm not the only one
: it's happened to.

: Yesterday I used a combination of laquer thinner followed by 220grit wet
: sanding. As of this morning the results are better. A little tacky, but
: not much.

: I have out-of-town visitors for a couple of days so I won't be able to do
: much. I'll follow up with more sanding followed by the ammonia wash.

: I suppose the thinning might have been part of the problem but the can
: indicated that the first coat should have been 50% thinned. I won't do
: that again. I think at 10% would have been more appropriate.

: Live and learn!