Archive for February, 2012

Race 8 is over

Visit Finland has crossed the finish line in 5th position in foggy Yellow Sea. We are waiting outside Qingdao overnight and entering the marina in the morning.

Yet another race is over, unfortunately we did not do very well in this race either. We’ll have to wait until morning our entry to Qingdao marina, then everybody collects their kits, checks into their hotels before starting a spree of deep clean and boat maintenance. Some reflection will be no doubt given to our finish position, as this time we did not reach podium place either. It seems as if the team has lost the racing focus, which can be very frustrating for driven crew members like myself.

Race 8 was supposed to be the most challenging of them all condition-wise in Clipper Race series, however the weather did not quite deliver what was hyped in advance. Snow torrents, sleet, gruelling conditions of all sorts were promised, but we spent most of the race bouncing gently upwind, then reaching until the finish line. Despite having 2-3 days of rough weather east of Taiwan, I -and most of the round the world crew members- agree that conditions around south and east of New Zealand were much more difficult during leg 4.

Looking back the past race, it felt really quick and short one being only 20 days! The most exciting event for me during the whole race was a mast climb yesterday in a breeze of 20 knots to fix jammed tracing line between first and second spreaders. This jam prevented us from reefing the main sail. Unjamming the line was easy, however the journey back to deck level got more complicated when a spinnaker halyard (used as secondary safety line) was blown to the aft of the mast by gusts. I could not be lowered as the spinnaker halyard was behind spreaders, so my options were either to disconnect the line from my climbing harness (certainly not my favourite option) or commence single-handed untangling operation whilst swinging up the mast. I chose the latter option, and fortunately after couple of tries the halyard popped back to forward of the mast and I was lowered back to the deck level without further drama.

Maintenance spree ahead

We have a lot of maintenance tasks to do in preparation for the North Pacific crossing. Our watermaker motor gave up the ghost today, needing intensive care from the maintenance team. Inverter, padeye, split kite, watermaker etc. cannot wait for later. The yacht needs to be ship shape and ready to go by Sunday 4th of March. Hopefully I’ll have time to enjoy local delicacies, I’m really looking forward to having some dim sum. A warm bath will be also very much appreciated, and a good lay in as you might guess!

Motoring towards Qingdao, 35 58′.324N 120 53′.930E

Dame East China Sea

Beating has changed to fine reaching on East China Sea. Conditions are flat and sunny on deck, and drier below deck now that we have been able to ventilate again.

Chinese fishing fleets are massive. Last night we sailed through a fleet of hundreds and hundreds of fishing boats, whilst dodging fishing pots marked with flags and buoys. Chinese military boat came around to check us out, however they did not contact us in any way – just disappeared after deciding we were not causing any trouble.

There is lots of cargo traffic as well, resembling very much Solent when you’ll look behind and see a giant cargo ship resembling a small city charging straight towards us, ploughing at 22 knots of speed. Yikes! Not a sight one relishes on a yacht trying to make best course to windward. It’s also tricky to identify vessels on AIS as there is so many of them that we’ll have to first take a bearing on a hand bearing compass, then match the bearing and approximate distance on AIS to make an educated guess which cargo ship or tanker we should call on VHF radio.

When we contact other vessels on colliding courses, first we ask whether they can see us on their radar and see the same CPA (Closest Point of Approach) as we do. Then we’ll politely enquire whether it would be possible for them to adjust their course to give us a little bit more clearance. Usually this is not a problem, we’ve had to alter our course to pass astern of a cargo ship.

Yes, Ma’am. No, Ma’am

Me (engaging friendly telephone voice, not too chirpy to be annoying at the midnight): Good evening Sir, this is CV11, we are a sailing boat at your port bow. It looks like our closest point of approach is 0.9 miles. Would you be able to confirm that we appear on your radar, please? Over.
The watch at cargo ship: Good evening, yes Ma’am, I can see you on our radar. The CPA is 1.0 miles, may I ask you to give us more clearance, please? Over.
Me: Sir, we are a sailing vessel making our best course to windward at the moment. I was hoping that you would be able to alter your course if possible. Are you perhaps constrained by draft? Over.
The watch: Negative, Ma’am. Ok, Let me alter our course to starboard. This will give you clearance of 2 miles. We will pass port to port. Over.
Me: Wonderful, thank you very much Sir. Let me confirm this again: We will hold our course, you will alter your course to starboard. We will pass port to port, red to red. Over.
The watch: Correct. We will pass port to port, red to red. Over.
Me:Thank you again for your assistance Sir, have a good night watch. CV11 out.
The watch: [Insert ships name here] out and standby on channel 06 and 16.

After this conversation I feel content and satisfied for successfully accomplished mission, then 5 minutes later horror creeps in as the ship does not alter its course after all. Then we’ll wake up the skipper and let him have the same conversation again with the same ship and watch.

Dame, Lady or Ma’am

Guys on Visit Finland call each other Sirs, half jokingly in style of The Master and Commander. This gives them a feeling of camaradery and friendship. I have been wondering what is the feminine version of this, as we women feel left out from the friendly banter. ‘Dame’ does not sound good for the purpose, even though it is an earned title. ‘Lady’ works even less so, being a title given to wives of Sir’s. ‘Ma’am’ makes me feel like a 75-year old sock knitting pensioner, hardly dynamic enough for a racing yacht. “Here’s your tea, Sir.” “Here’s your tea, Lady/Dame/Ma’am/Pet/Love/Sugar.” All just bad or even worse: patronising.

Any suggestions from the folks at home?

Dames & Sirs of the East China Sea at 29 38′.047N 123 15′.080E

Wet’n'cold

Visit Finland has cleared Luzon Strait and entered East China Sea after couple of bouncy days. Weather has cooled down and crew is donning full foulies, mid-layers, hats and gloves.

Indeed it was like flip of the weather switch: shorts, t-shirts and sun creams are gone for good. Everything has to be in dry bags from now on, as condensation is wetting everything left hanging out from the bunk. I experienced this first hand when discovered that my boots were soaked inside out thanks to condensation dripping straight into them. I’ve had to already dig out the waterproof socks and engage in rather complicated logistics of keeping my dry suit dry inside, when everything is wet up on deck and down below.

Skipper Oli got laughing fits when I tried to fashion a waterproof bottom from a bin liner for keeping my base layers dry whilst sitting on wet cushions by the nav desk. Who knew it would have been useful to bring rain trousers for leisure wear on board? Perhaps I’ll find a cheap pair from China. The binliner bottom failed despite good tries of cutting the corners off – the material is too flimsy. I hate to admit it, but my derriere did not fit in that rather small plastic bag.

Towards China

We’re trucking towards China now after clearing the Ocean sprint phase of the race. We’re slighly short handed now on my watch after couple of crash bang topple overs down below and a knee click on deck. Currently we’re only 3 able bodied heavy weather helms on deck at any time, so that’s a lot of work for few. We rotate three people on deck: one resting and warming up down below, three up on deck: the helm, shotgun and a gatekeeper. Despite sounds of it, we are not carrying firearms. A shotgun is a backup for helm, should s/he lose balance or control of the boat. Gatekeeper is seated next to the companionway making sure everyone clips on safety lines when getting up on deck.

The other day I was helming when true wind got up to 42 knots and apparent wind up to 47 knots. It was rather worrying for me as the guys were working on foredeck sorting out a snapped storm jib sheet, and it was my responsibility to keep them safe in rather lively conditions. In those situations you’ll just need to keep breathing and focus on feathering the boat upwind without crash tacking in big ocean swell.

Sleep

Sleeping is now easier when the boat does not crash and bounce quite as much as few days ago. We were truly airborne a good portion of the time off watch, and it was essential to sleep feet towards the bow. I dug out my waterproof sleeping bag yesterday, and to my horror discovered it was all mouldy! Who knows where the moisture had gotten into a dry bag, but there I was wiping the bag with bleach while should have been catching up precious sleep.

I’m heading off to my bunk now before cooking cous cous dinner for the crew with Carl.

Toodle-oo from East China Sea, 27 05′.822N 122 28′.623E

Night of the flying fish

Visit Finland has entered Luzon Strait yesterday evening. We can see Edinburgh, New York and Derry-Londonderry in our AIS (Automatic Identification System).

Since we entered Luzon Strait, the sea state started building up as wind over current means plenty of chop. We had an exciting night in lively sea, wind blowing F7-8′s. We are currently carrying two reefs in our main sail, staysail and a storm jib as the wind was gusting up to 30 knots and the apparent wind reached 40′s.

Helming the boat with this sail configuration feels like driving a car on ice. The nose is very light, as the main sail is currently the primary means of powering the yacht. Driving has been like a slippery slope; the slightest movement alternates the course for 20 degrees.

Flying fish are attracted to us with such intensity that I have been chucking them overboard aplenty last night. I was helming when one landed to my feet, and it remained there flapping about for painfully long time. I could not bend to throw it back in the sea, nor couldn’t give it a gentle kick towards water as I had to keep both feet in angled surface and hands on the wheel. Since when has an omnivore felt bad about fish dying by her feet? Well, since last night.

Spinnaker sabotage?

Strangely enough we have managed to bust our medium weight spinnaker the other day. Wind was blowing abeam for some time, so we had our spinnaker tacked on the tack strop and flying it like large jib. The apparent wind was not more than 9 knots, but the spinnaker just suddenly split in L-shaped half near to the foot. Della, our media crew was just interviewing Oli about our kit, shooting footage with spinnaker in the background:

Della: Your medium weight spinnaker looks very pristine compared to other yachts, why is that? Oli: We take good care of our gear. Spinnaker: *SPLIT*

Since Della’s arrival our spinnaker has split, backstay padeye failed, inverter hasn’t been working, diesel is leaking from the tanks to the bilges, water maker makes water very slowly. Could there be some stealthy sabotage going on for better TV? Della denies, the crew suspects.

Up north

In few days we should reach south of Taiwan. Hopefully by then the sea sick crew will be alive again, as at the moment about 30% of the crew has fallen to the charms of the green sea monster. I find sea swell just interesting change from the normal slogging, some rollercoaster action gives some interest to the sailing in these latitudes!

Towards Hashia Channel at 21 11′.124N 121 08′.491E

Going ape in sunshine & fair winds

Visit Finland is trucking on in South China Sea towards lighter winds.

Next few days should be light winded according to the weather forecasts we have received. During morning shift our Yin watch did an excellent sail change from Y2 to Y1. Tea from Yang watch was around helping, and she reckons this change was the fastest headsail change in history of Visit Finland. Shame it wasn’t timed! We take pride in being efficient and consistent. It helps that everyone involved did know exactly what needed to happen and in which order, so instructions were not necessary – just crack on and get it done.

At the moment we have watches of 5 and 6 crew on deck (1 + 1 mothering), and I have to say that this feels like an ideal number for sailing these Clipper 68′s. More people than this participating in an evolution means more confusion, less people means less lifting power. Obviously in lively conditions we’ll need more hands on deck for simply pulling the sail down, but light to moderate winds this current number works like a dream. During Clipper training it has become clear that evolutions do not get done faster with a lot of people hovering around. Quite the opposite: everyone wants to help but there isn’t always enough jobs for everyone, and two persons for one job just spells disaster. This streamlined watch feels fast, efficient, competent and therefore very enjoyable.

Summer continues

We are still wearing shorts and t-shirts as temperatures continue being warm here in the South China Sea. We’ve shed off even the spray jackets and abandoned salopettes to the wet locker for good. This race has been dubbed the most challenging of them all in Clipper Race series, however at the moment it does not feel like a challenge. Either conditions will have to change dramatically somewhere around Taiwan or I will be truly disappointed!

At the moment I’m suspecting that the most challenging conditions we have already seen south and east of New Zealand, and another challenging race will be from Derry-Londonderry to the Netherlands rounding Scotland as we go.

Pekka, Visit Finland crew member, relayed news from Finland that there has been record breaking temperatures in Finnish Lapland, reaching -42.7 C°. What is little snow icing on deck compared to this? A turkish bath. I strongly suspect that it’s really not a big deal to sail for few days in below 0 temperatures, after all we’ve trained in wintery UK and anyone who has sailed in The North Sea knows how it’s like when it gets cold. Am I again just a smug arctic baboon dissing the more southerly population? Quite possibly. However it would be much more useful to be a spider monkey as in addition to opposable thumbs and toes they also have a gripping tail. Now *that* would be useful on board!

Onward and upward

Clipper Race is for many round the world crew members an opportunity to stop and rethink what they want to do in the future. My own plans for life after Clipper Race are forming slowly but surely. Lately I have been grappling with mixed feelings and thoughts about amateur team racing and what the future holds for me after returning to Southampton in July 2012.

What are the chances of returning to the old life that you hate after spending a year doing something you love?

My motivations for participating in Clipper Race and doing RYA Offshore Yachtmaster training has been simply to escape office life and unleash change. It remains to be seen how exactly this change will manifest itself, but it is well on its way already. Certainly I will do everything to avoid returning to the office work and carry on sailing across oceans.

Task one: Complete circumnavigation

The first task on my return is to find ways to complete my personal circumnavigation. I fractured my wrist in August before arriving to Brazil during Clipper Race Leg 1, therefore I have missed a stretch across South Atlantic from Rio (Brazil) to Cape Town (SA) and another across Southern Ocean from Cape Town (SA) to Geraldton (Australia).

This accident was and still is hugely disappointing, as what is a round the world crew member who has not circumnavigated in the end? The return to Southampton will not be an accomplishment for me, so I will need to return with something else as a reward for all the trouble. Skills, knowledge, learnings of all sorts. Some people like myself are plagued with perfectionism: it’s all or nothing – somewhere in the middle is not good enough.

I will start looking into yacht races and deliveries stretching across South Atlantic and Southern Ocean to complete the round the world mission that was rudely interrupted by broken bones. Please give me a shout if you’d know someone who needs a first mate or super competent race crew for these passages, thank you very much!

Scheming and plotting in 17°26′.131N 117°39′.315E

Boat bounce grand slam

Water woes and computer gloom onboard. Bouncy seas have calmed to Y1 conditions in South China Sea.

Helming has been interesting for the past few days. We had F5-7 winds for a while, which made everyone feel as if we were moving after so many weeks of just bobbing and motoring during the previous race. Temperatures are still pleasant outdoors, we wear shorts and spray jackets up on deck as there is water spraying all over, when the helm hits an inevitable random wave. Couple of squalls have called for salopettes, but now the wind has moderated again and we’ve changed from Y3 to Y2 to Y1 and shaken a reef during our morning watch.

Anti-slam plan

The waves have various shapes, sizes and sequences around here. Sometimes you’ll find the boat climbing up a big wave, then plunging straight down; sometimes there are multiple short, choppy waves wedging themselves under the boat when you’ve just managed to block the first one. The most important task of the helms(wo)man is to prevent the boat slamming down the waves. Each slam slows down the boat speed and reverberates through hull and rigging alarmingly. There is a simple principle to prevent slamming: keep the rudder biting during the climb and descent. Sometimes this is easier said than done, especially in the night time when you cannot see the waves, just feel the nose pitching up, down or sideways.

Games in progress

I’ve been developing ideas for a new Nintendo Mario Bros. game called Super Mario Boat Bounce Grand Slam. Obviously I’ll sell this concept for big money.

In the game the player negotiates an ocean sprint amid various kinds of obstacles and waves. Every successfully negotiated wave adds points to the total. Every time the player slams the boat, water spray steams the drivers goggles and points will be deducted. In this situation the boat goes all over the place as the driver cannot see anything for a while. In tropics the driver has to avoid turtles and palm tree logs in the water, while in arctic areas the icebergs and heckling penguins crowd the race course. These need to be avoided for obvious reasons. (Don’t worry, if you’ll run over a turtle, they’ll just look surprised, then retreat inside their shells while bouncing comically up in the air and off the screen letting a squeak as they go.) There are also treasure chests floating in the water, which the player needs to collect for extra points. Every now and then the driver starts suffering from sea sickness, and has to collect medicine to ease the condition. Too much medicine will cause hallucinations though, so careful with the quantities or zebras and giraffes will start trodding all over the deck!

Naturally there is a match race mode for multi-player gaming and autopilot for 20 mins every time the driver needs to take a nap. The game goes on for 2 weeks, so the players cannot go to school or work during this time. Nor can they change clothes, take showers or order take away food. Only tinned or dried food is allowed, but I will relax the rules about the heads. Use of normal home toilets are allowed, although a bucket would be more realistic for single handed sailors. Buckets of cold water will be thrown over the players in arctic areas, and if you’ll get wet – tough – only 3 changes of clothes are allowed.

This is a success story just waiting to happen.

Water woes

It took 48 hours to fill one small water tank, which was great deal of trouble for everyone involved. Also it was very stressful for me as I’m responsible for the water making in the boat. We’re currently using our last tank of water, and just 30 minutes ago managed to fill up one tank after days of trying in vain.

There are few reasons for water making trouble: – Generator. The generator uses the same water intake as the water maker. When the generator and water maker are running at the same time, a lot of air goes into water maker as there isn’t enough water coming through for both devices. Air bubbles get stuck in pipes and the pressure drops, effectively stopping the water making in its tracks. Someone needs to be watching the water maker at all times and bleed the air from the system – day and night. As our inverter is busted, we’ll have to run the generator a lot to power up the screens.

- Speed and sea state. Choppy seas and high boat speed makes the water maker gulp air and therefore jam the system until the air has been bled. This is not ideal for beating as we will all the way to China.

- Inattentive crew ignoring the water making rules. There are four simple rules when it comes to water making: 1) Use one water tank at a time. Not two. Not three tanks shalt Thou use. Nor four is permitted. One is the number of tanks Thou shalt use. 2) Use both tanks on the same side before swapping over to the other side. (We’ve got 2 x 195 l tanks each side.) 3) Update the chart showing the current water tank situation. Our water tanks have three statuses: Full, Empty, Filling. 4) Tell me when both tanks on one side are empty so that I can start the water maker. Disasters happen when more than one of these rules have been broken simultaneously. Or indeed, all of them, just like two days ago.

Disappearing act

The current watermaker, generator and inverter trouble means that I cannot post blogs quite as often as I’d like, thanks to erratic access to the email computer. So if you don’t hear from me for a week, it just means that I’m in water making business up to my ears while being horribly grumpy and disapproving of anyone wanting to use computers (and therefore running a generator, causing all the trouble). Just like now!

Smug double standards near Macclesfield Bank, 13°08′.354N 115°26′.481E

Hairy moments

Visit Finland has finally found some wind and is now speeding up towards north and China in lovely sunshine. New daily duties have been added to the list of jobs, while our computer screens are still not working normally.

The core of our computer screen trouble is that they are running off normal mains voltage, provided by an inverter that is dysfunctional at the moment. The inverter failure does not affect our computers at all as they are built for boat environment and they draw the power directly from the battery. However computers cannot be used without screens, so there we are, powering computer screens through experimental electrical engineering from the mains plug when the generator is running. Generator consumes diesel, so we cannot keep it running all the way to China.

I am following our diesel and battery situation with great interest, as I have resumed water making activities today and currently filling up both starboard side tanks. The water maker has already been on for 24 hours without overflow, indicating problems. The sea state may be a little bit too choppy for our poor old watermaker to function without hiccups.

Pan & brush duty

Steering check duty involves clambering down to lazarette and inspecting the steering cables connecting from the wheel to the rudder. Usually this job is done within 5 minutes of opening the hatch, therefore an additional cleaning job has been added to the steering check duty. A lot of food crumbs end up on the floor during each meal, therefore we are now preventing growth of new crew members by brushing the saloon floor and washing the cockpit every day.

This wouldn’t be too bad at all, unless one cheeky chap decided to have a maintenance day the other day and shave his head straight there in the saloon. If you have ever been to Clipper yachts, you’d know that the floor is like super grainy sand paper. Hair sticks to it like no tomorrow, and so pan and brush are completely futile in the cleaning job. Perhaps a roll of duct tape would offer more efficient cleaning power?

I have earlier suggested a resolution to our persistent loose hair trouble, but no action has been taken yet to my great astonishment. The core of the problem is that human hair does not stick to head, chest, leg or derriere as it should, but finds its way to every nook and cranny when the opportunity arises. My solution is very simple: full body waxing.

On *my* boat anyone intending to stay on board definitely has to get waxing done, sorry chaps for any possible distress. Mine is very disciplined -even militant- yacht, I must admit. When it comes to hairstyles, we can complement smooth bodies with streamlined hairstyles: The short hair needs to be very short, say 5 mm max, and long hair needs to be always tidily on a ponytail, bun or plait. Easy! The days of hairstyle as an expression of one’s personality are over. If any of the ladies were doubtful, the guys here reminded that Sinead O’Connor was very attractive woman with shaven head in mid-90′s music scene. You’ll only need classic bone structure, good complexion and pixie eyes to match the beauty.

Rosy horror

Talking of hair. Our victualler has found a cordial flavour that sounds really attractive. Rose. The raspberry coloured cordial lets us anticipate slightly sweet yet refreshing drink, like sniffing a freshly blossomed rose early in the morning when the grass is still dewy and you can feel the coolness of the night in the air. In reality this is the worst drink I have tried for a long time, hands down. Try imagining artificial rose flavoured water strained through sugar and dogs’ hair, then imagine it’s thrice worse. This cordial is going to go overboard very soon.

In Singapore this rose cordial was seen to be served mixed with milk, which I cannot imagine making it any better. It would rather give an impression of 16 huskies swimming through a milk river, then rolling in sugar before a wash; collect the water, add rose flavour, bottle and sell by glass in the food market. Intriguing? Yes. Enjoyable? An acquired taste.

I wonder how cordial producers have arranged the husky washing line? How they can afford keeping thousands of dogs? Do the dogs get distressed from constant rinsing? Does the flavour suffer if the dogs are too clean?

Perplexed in Borneo, 7 35′.083N 110 45′.241E

Sweet cinnamon rolls

Third day onboard Visit Finland sees light breeze and sunshine up on deck, inverter trouble down below.

Skipper Oli and Del have been troubleshooting our inverter since early morning. Last night both computer screens went blank, therefore we are unable to use not only Raymarine radar (nonfunctional since race start), but also our electronic charts and email. Search for overload failure in our electronics has continued ever since. Their latest innovation allows running one computer screen at a time powered directly by the generator. Paper charts have been unearthed and sequenced to follow our route from Singapore to China.

Light airs

This computer trouble puts us in disadvantage against other yachts in the race, so it is in our interests to fix it as soon as possible. Troubleshooting continues hectically in current light winds. Tomorrow the wind should increase, which is great for sailing, but bad news for computer troubleshooting as the heeling angle will make all efforts exponentially more laboured.

Today I am mothering again with Carl, the Swedish viking. We’ve just survived lunch – chicken soup and quesadillos for 15 people. For dinner we will prepare cous cous with chorizo, olives and tomato sauce. I’m about to bake some Finnish sweet cinnamon rolls, as conditions are so flat that even baking in the galley is like a walk in the park.

Hygiene above all

Mother watch has given an opportunity for some personal maintenance, namely hair wash, pedicure and a full body wet wipe wash. During this race 8 we have been allocated one wet wipe pack each, totalling 4 wipes per day. This isn’t nearly enough for maintaining everyday hygiene, therefore it is best to always buy couple of spare packs for personal stash.

It is quite remarkable that on land I have to remind myself that normal people take showers every day. (Fortunately I’m not the only sailor reporting this lapse.) Normal people also brush their hair at least once a day. Then again, normal people probably brush their teeth only twice a day.

You see, on the boat we do not usually shower at all in order to conserve fresh water. At times it also gets so cold that lukewarm wash is simply not tempting enough. Hair brushing gets little attention in constant on and off watch changes, where night and day mingle intermittently. I keep my shoulder length hair tied on a tight bundle day and night. My hair had a date with a brush last time three days ago in Singapore.

Hair may be washed once a week during mother watch, which is always great yet shampoo consuming, thanks to multiple soapings that are required for squeaky clean results. (Thanks Meg for the shampoo bar, what a lovely and useful surprise parcel it was!) If all this puts you off from ocean sailing, I can offer some solace disclosing that dental hygiene is much better onboard, as teeth may be brushed 4-5 times a day when getting off-watch and going to sleep. (Flossing should be daily routine too, says every dentist.)

If looks could shrill

Another empowering change from normal life is that not women nor men wear make up on board. In this environment I consider make up just dirt that I would not voluntarily put on my face, mascara being the worst smudger. The crew has already seen each other in natural state (even in complete disarray), so who we’d try to fool with make up anyway?

All this leads to a question whether the standards of land and sea will clash fiercely on my return. I wonder is there any correlation between being a sailor and being single? This just as an afterthought, if the efforts to woo a partner limit to taking a shower and changing into clean clothes!

Baking in South China Sea, 5 22′.467N 108 12.740E

It’s good to be back racing!

First day of race 8 has passed nicely on board Visit Finland. We’re settling into watch system again and troubleshooting boat gear.

Visit Finland is back in the sea racing towards Qingdao, China. The send off from Singapore Keppel Bay Marina was lovely with drummers and dancers on stage, while boats left the pontoon one after another. Crews cheered to each other across boats, wishing everybody safe journey and good racing.

Start

We motored to Nongsa Point (apologies for poor spelling) where the start line was set between two committee boats. Visit Finland got a good start, we were third or fourth over line as far as I could observe, as there were some rather exciting sights ahead such as Welcome to Yorkshire almost being rammed by some other boat in the usual start line kerfuffle. Gold Coast had to take an extra turn around a committee boat and start line, apparently they had sneaked over the line early.

Once we were well underway, it was quite difficult to stay awake during the first night watch. The worst moments were around 4 am when I was trying to focus on watching mainsail trim, and the next moment I woke up because of having nodded off and about to fall sideways in the cockpit. We had such close encounter with New York that Ruth’s voice could be heard across water shouting something. Oli had to radio them and remind that we’re on starboard tack (and therefore have right of way), and eventually New York altered their course to let us pass in front.

Team dynamics in motion

We have sadly lost three crew members since the last race. Commodore and Mandy have left for personal reasons, and Mark was transferred to New York as they were lacking a qualified yachtmaster from the team thanks to an injury onboard. In exchange Della has joined us as media crew, she will be filming us during the race to Qingdao for the documentary. Less crew means that everyone gets a “good” bunk, nobody has to sleep on hospital bunks. Less crew also means more work for everyone else, which can be also a great thing for learning as people learn sailing primarily by doing.

Fail!

We have had some hiccups with the boat already. The wind instruments disappeared completely for the majority of the day. We had no idea about wind strength and the direction was also questionable, therefore it was best to utilise good old wind instruments also known as ears. (Rotate your head until you feel the wind evenly passing both ears – you’re facing the direction from where the wind is blowing.) It turns out that our wind instruments at the mast end do not like rain! They malfunction when it gets wet, which is slightly inconvenient as we’re surrounded by water after all.

Raymarine radar is not functioning at the moment, and so we are unable to see any approaching squalls, traffic or more worryingly use MOB button in case someone went overboard. Everyone is strictly forbidden from going overboard now. There’s absolutely mind boggling amount of traffic in this area, therefore radar is really essential piece of kit. At the moment we cannot see any details about the surrounding traffic, such as calculations for closest point of approach, estimated time of passing, type of vessel etc. that give us an idea whether a ship is going to be a problem to us or not. Good old hand bearing compass and binoculars are in good use now.

The good news is that the skippers emergency goodie bag that I prepared in Gold Coast has been successfully utilised in combat against frustration. Fudge went down well with a good cup of coffee, keeping the moral high in times of trouble!

Passing a cruiser called Double Fantasy in Malaysia, 2 33′.582N 106 47′.810E