Wednesday 2nd December 2015: Last night we listened to our first Christmas Carols! DJ Dave’s jolly and never ending selection of Christmas tunes blasted out from the snake pit’s (area where many ropes are controlled from situated in the middle of the deck) speakers. Everyone sang along to the Poges and Ave Maria. Glad he thought about bringing those along.
Today is Lucia’s – my – birthday! I woke up for my 3am watch with balloons hanging around my bunk with gold gauze draped around the door (oh gosh I must have a very deep sleep not to have noticed all the shenanigans).
The galley was equally garlanded with courgette shaped balloons and Happy Birthday posters.
They sang happy birthday as I came up the companionway. We are 17.10.35N and 044.04.40 W – i.e. in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean and I am celebrating my birthday. Loving it! Let the party begin, or not, as I am on mother watch today so cooking and cleaning for me with the lovely Mike.
There was suspicious behaviour from Rosie and B as they stopped me coming into the galley but I had their number as I could smell chocolate in the air. Voila – I was right!- choc brownies were produced for breakfast.
As a present to the amazing crew I decided on a suicide mission to make pancakes with the boat healing ever just slightly. Results delicious wonky pancakes.
Clue: With a Pipe in the Water Closet
Today starts the game of Cludo. Trust nobody except for Skip and Mate who are adjudicators. It will be murder on the deck floor with a bucket for some I am sure.
And here goes the poo team again with Kirsty taking over from Rosie. After yesterday’s clearing of the port side poo pipe, Dave has decided to clear the starboard one just in case it fails on us. It’s a smelly job but essential to boat maintenance and crew regularity.
There were rain clouds following us most of the night although we only got showers once. This was a helping from the rain Gods as Ricki has told us that if we carry on using 400l a day by having multiple showers the water rations shall begin. Next showers will be on deck when we are hit by a squall.
As we approach the Caribbean it is getting warmer and warmer and the heat is affecting some of the crews’ sleep. Consuelo has only had 2 hours sleep in the last 24 hours but seems quite well on it as long as we keep feeding her chocolate and caffeine.
Love to all and happy birthday to Market, wish you were here so we could celebrate together. Steve please reserve a seat for me at the Christmas party – I’m definitely coming. Lucia
Lucia and Mike:
Counting the days to hear news from home…so hard not to be in touch with babies’ developments. Hope all in Spain are following our antics (Lots of love – Begonia the scribe).
Who will pip who to the winning line? Challenger 1 (blue) or the heroic and unstoppable Challenger 3 (orange)?
0500 No Sleep to St Lucia
The starry night has clouded over and progress has been good through the night with some fast boat speeds and the odd squall, Daniel having an exciting end to his watch.
Yesterday the long poo pipe was squirrelled out of its home and placed on deck where Ricky, Dave and Rosie took one for the team and unblocked the port heads. Jerry and Steve got involved…Steve accidently ended up wearing some of the unblocked ‘Matter’ – rather unfortunate!
Lucia had a surprise at 3am with a boat full of Happy Birthday decorations …a good way to start a very long birthday day in the sunshine! Smiles all around.
B mastered the helm in top style…tomorrow for some night helming. Others are struggling to sleep in the increasingly hot, humid air, I’ve been sleeping (ish!) on deck and I don’t think Consuela has slept in two days.
Ricky keeps appearing like a zombie in-between squalls, sneaking up to the chart table to check the winds resulting in a typical boat style dilemma… One minute he was there talking the next he was having a quick 5 minute nap … on top of where the pancake mix lives… “he’ll wake up in a minute, there’s another squall due to hit” – oh there he goes, the next squalls hit and he’s on deck, in the dark with his body wash and shampoo at 6am…
…anyway, another squall and pancakes on the way. Hopefully the new day will continue with good winds. Chit chat is now constantly circling back to fine foods on land, dancing, parties, Rum and swimming in the sea….St Lucia here we come!
Kirstie WL
Sailing: It Takes Gusts!
There is a fine line between bravery, pushing the race boat hard, trusting in the accumulated training and skill of the crew to steer a stable and true course in gusty winds and lumpy seas – and foolhardiness in over stretching your capabilities and breaking the one precious resource which you have to beat your competition – your biggest best spinnaker.
The “Race Kite” has been up and flying since midday on the 27th, coming on five straight days. Prior to that we had the “Flanker”, a heavier and smaller reaching kite up, which we launched at 10am on the 26th – six days of spinnaker magic, or six days of spinnaker madness?
The squalls are the big unknown and are causing me constant aggravation. You can see the black cloud approaching. It isn’t raining yet. Now is that cloud going to pass harmlessly past? Is it going to start raining, but give you little change in the wind – surprisingly a lot are like this, this has come as a bit of a surprise for me – I remember in the past almost all rainy clouds at this latitude come with significant wind. Or is this going to be the squall that pushes us across that line between bravery and foolhardiness?
So far we have held our nerve and have taken each squall as it has come and steered a fast and furious course dead downwind in the torrential rain for those clouds which have been the mean and evil kinds.
There is not much of a tactical advantage which we can get from being South anymore. I think we have 1 or 2 knots of extra wind, but I could maybe do without them in the gusts. The boat speed is mostly over 9 knots and often charging beyond 10 knots. My own personal best last night was 13.9!
So it does all come down to treading that fine line and not being knocked over on the side of being foolhardy. I have been here before many a time and I still don’t know how to judge it “just right”.
On a lighter note, it is Lucia’s birthday and all the stops have been pulled out to make it a fantastic joyous occasion. The “Happy Birthday To Ya” music is in full swing on the boat speakers.
Jerry and Mark spent a lot of time last night blowing up packets of balloons and decorating the entire boat. Only a few scared the skipper to death as the popped with a deafening BANG while I was down below trying to find a sliver of wind advantage.
The BANG of a balloon sounds unnervingly like the bang of a spinnaker exploding into a scattering of bits…
Ricky (Skipper)
If you fancy racing across the Atlantic join us next year on the ARC 2016
