" A LADY TRIP " Sailing around the World, (presently at sea)
A Lady
Stephen Hyde
Wed 10 Mar 2010 23:35
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TUESDAY 9th MARCH
2010 Day 2
04.30hrsThe Skipper is lying along the cockpit seat
with his back to the hatch, watching the sea rush past and the
phospherous
sparkling in the night.the ensign fluttering over
the covered up rib, which looks like a small whale hanging
off the transome, All just wonderfull
stuff
The sky is a very pale blue as it begins a new dawn
with the stars flickering like silver pinheads
keeping the waining Moon company up
there.
It strikes the skipper that big and all " A
Lady" is , she seems very small and low in the water out here
,
where as she looks positivly BIG on the marina in
Crosser, However this is wonderfull sailing, 19knots of wind and doing 9.2
knots SOG
Its a long way from the lovely old leaking gaff
rigged boats we were brought up in. I remember being tied up to the pier
in Cobh listening to the Cathedral bells ringingevery 15 minutes . We had
dropped Marlyn and the Gibson twins off in Monkstown and hadent enough wind
to get back to crosser, so wound up having a musical evening in
Cobh.
12.00 Fats did the radio check, ie, check in our
position and wind conditions, and recieve everyone else's
positions,
We seem to have more wind than anyone else, but we
went much further south too., Anyway thats good for us.
Fats, remember, was a Helicopter navigator and
radio officer with the R A F back in the good old days,
Pity he cant get our radios to work properly,
13.30 Aileen did a light lunch , while the rest
cleaned the decks and cockpit.
16,30hrs The wind has eased back , but the sky to
the west does not look good, meanwhile Fats is crashed out for his mid afternoon
nap.
The black sky ahead reminds the skipper of a trip
he did with Joe Hawes a long time ago,
We were sailing his little 22' boat from the south
coast of England back to cork, ( grab this, we had no charts, but the wind was
SE
and the weather nice and settled) so we set off on
a friday night, full of the joys of life and Gin,
Saturday night, a little over half way, we spotted
this big black cloud in the distance and before we knew waht, it was right over
head.
The rain came down like Niagra Falls and the
lightning was really scarey, It rained lightning down on us two Ejits. in this
tiny yoke.
When I informed Joe that when we got hit by the
lightning, then we would just melt into the sea,
His trousers went a funny brown colour, with myself
in the same boat, we shat ourselves into reality and started to pray out
loud,
so God could hear us over the noise of the thunder,
Then all of a sudden, the cloud passed away, like if it just died.
WOW
Now are we looking at the same thing comming up
here! we will have to wait and see ,
18.00hrs Fats cooked dinner, just fillet steak with
rice and a few bits,
meanwhile the Skipper finished the book " Mc
Carthy's Bar" a marvoulas read,
The night watches :-
Fats..........21.00hrs to
oo.oohrs
Aileen.........00.00hrs to 03.oohrs
Stephen......03.00hrs to
06.00hrs
The wind was consistantly blowing at 22knots and
gusting 25, great sailing.
Signed :- Stephen
Hyde, ( Skipper )
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