The Beast is tamed (well almost)

Cat-man-do
Thu 29 Nov 2007 23:54
Some of our "regular" readers will be aware of the slight problems we've been having with a wild sausage we have on board. Well, this morning after flying it aloft for several hours and it behaving itself rather nicely we needed to take it down as there were rather more squalls in the area than it than we'd have been comfortable with had we still been flying it. So with a little trepidation we set about the task and it was all going quite swimmingly until the very last moment when the sheets (ropes that normally tie the beast down and run to the back of the boat) all went flying straight through their respective pulleys and threw themselves under the boat. Luckily there were no engines running at the time as this can be a huge problem if things get stuck around the propellers. After the customary jumping up and down and generally cursing things in general we set about getting the ropes out from under both hulls and the width of the boat. Fortunately they weren't too difficult to get out and we were soon on our way again. We did have a cracking run this morning down the side of a squall where the winds picked up and we romped away at up to 10knots. It's been a day of scattered squalls some being quite intensive the last one being about 9 this evening, when it was decided the sausage needed to put away ("here we go again" I hear you say) However, guess what? on this occasion whilst not being of racing crew speed, all went well without a hitch. It's now about midnight whilst I write this and all's well with the world.
Howard has been practicing his guitar skills and is making steady progress, with all of us picking it up and having a pluck occasionally.
Otherwise you'll be pleased to know a much quieter day, and the feedback we're getting from home is that we're not as far back in the pack as we thought we were i.e at the back. We're not entirely sure where the Essex boys are, having initially thought they were well ahead of us, it would appear that maybe we have a slight edge on them. Maybe our race is not yet run.....
 
Has the beast finally been tamed?
 
To be continued