Some Well Deserved R&R for Mercury Rising
Mercury-rising
Mon 28 Nov 2005 20:57
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After a couple of very good days of progress, the
skipper has allowed his
exhausted but dedicated crew some well earned R&R. Luckily we came across a lovely smooth part of sea - an oasis from the unrelenting spray and foam of fast reaches - where we dropped anchor in 4000m of clear blue water thus allowing the crew to relax, swim and for the lucky few there was a 35 mile trip in the dinghy to the nearest island to search for coconuts and ground nuts. Unfortunately diving off the boat proved a lot easier than climbing back on so an elaborate system of steps, loops and straps was fettled from Mercury Rising's stores and crew retrieval is now complete.  Unfortunately the anchorage became rather crowded as another boat appeared over the horizon, so our break was short lived and we are all now back in the saddle eager to take the bit between the teeth and finish the course (enough cliches, Ed) In common with other finely tuned racing yachts weight is at a premium, and from the start the crew of Mercury Rising have been strictly rationed on the amount of personal gear they have been allowed to bring aboard. In fact while MP3 players are allowed they are limited to just 10 albums' worth of music each to save weight. Our competitive skipper is always looking for extra ways to reduce the payload so he has ordered that the beer and wine be drunk up at a faster rate than before and yesterday ordered that half the cutlery be jettisoned overboard. |