'STEINLAGER' moment. Day 11. 14:52N 39:28W
MALARKEY
Jo & Trevor Bush
Sat 30 Dec 2006 11:33
|
Last night was the best night sail for a long time.
It was a 'Steinlager' moment.
I remember watching the start of one of the
Whitbread Round the World yacht races. They were heading west with all their
canvas up in fairly stiff conditions with a sloppy sea. Steinlager appeared to
be going fast, bolt upright and in total control when compared with the other
competitors. I remember thinking to myself that this would be the one out
of the bunch I would prefer to race on. Whilst Malarkey can not be
compared in any way to Steinlager, last night she performed
spectacularly.
The moon was out, visibility was perfect. The wind
was blowing at 22knts and both the sea & the wind were coming right up
the clacker. It was warm but fresh and with gentle breaking Atlantic
rollers hissing under the transom. I was listening to Jo's MP3 player at full
blast. It couldn't get any better, so I thought. Shaun on the other hand
did not quite agree, he was trying to get some sleep in the cockpit while I was
belting out some of my faves forgeting how totally out of tune my singing is. He
decided if you cant beat 'em, join 'em, and sat up & enjoyed the ride
too.
Malarkey was pretty steady despite the sea. The 2
poled out foresails keeping her fairly true and at good speeds. For a period of
12 hours the GPS never read less than 7.5 knts and sometimes as high as
12.7knts. You could tell when when we were going fast, a surfing rumble eminated
from under the hull. The longer the rumble lasted the faster we went.
On the very long ones we would dash to the log and check the max speed. It never
got much higher than 13.8knt but that was fast enough. The sound of
the surfing rumble combined with the whoosh of our wake could be heard over
the music.
We covered 103M last night. I guess every boat crossing an ocean will have a Steinlager
moment, this was ours.
|