22/6/09 - 7.59.6S 123.08W as at 18.00 UTC

Flying Cloud
Julian Nichols
Mon 22 Jun 2009 05:34
We spent most of today replacing the Starboard gear cable, which parted soon after Panama. It wasn't helped by the fact that i dropped an essential part down an impossible-to-get-to hole. Eventually Matt found it and we were back in business.
Just as we began to do up our boxing bindings, the fishing reel began singing - we had a fish! Of course no sooner than the bindings were off and we busy reeling than the fish somehow unhooked itself! Ahwell we have plenty anyway.
Boxing went well - Matt got me with a few good punches, but my ducking and diving is much better.


Julian

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Captain's corner:
It was definitely an excellent day today... Always more satisfying to have spent the day be properly productive! So it's hard to tell from the photos, but the first one is before Jules decided it would be a good idea to chuck a crucial (tiny) part down into the back of beyond, and the second one is him putting on a brave face while trying to find it... In the first shot, he's using our very expensive, highly specialised emergency Hydraulic rig cutters to snip the old gear cable in half... Not much different than hunting squirrels with an elephant gun! As for the second, he was looking in the wrong place... The part had falled through a hole in the dvd cupboard, down through little holes on both levels of the dry goods cupboard, and lodged itself between the tangle of cables hidden behind his closet, which is hidden by a second skin! Between the two of us, hours, (yes actually hours) were spent to find the part, both of us giving up more than once. At one point I spent a good while trying to figure out exactly how I was going to jury rig a bit, and returned to my original conclusion: Either I had to find the part or wait a good month with no gear controls until a replacement part came.... I found the part!
So at the end of the day we managed to finish putting it all back together, and test run the motor etc... After that, can you blame me if I suggested we did a little bit of boxing? Would anyone begrudge me giving Jules' nose a little tickle a couple of times? I think not!
A happy crew is a crew who can vent on each other!

Mattman