Thursday 1st December
Nowcrew
Thu 1 Dec 2005 13:11
In position 20.08N
43.43W
Always take the weather
with you.
Torrential rain was the
order of the day. At sunrise it was absolutely tipping down. Everyone was down
below except for the two poor soles who were on duty. It seemed like it would
never stop.
The smell of steaming men's
bodies combined with the heat and the lack of showers was quite
potent.
It was like Manchester sur la mer.
The kind of weather we thought we'd left
behind.
Suddenly a cabin door
opened and out skipped Tom, stark naked carrying nothing but a bottle of
shampoo, he was whistling a little tune. Tom skipped his way on to deck and
stood underneath the heavens - this was showering al-fresco
style.
To all our amusement, he
roared, laughed and sang while he washed.
Lunch was conjured up by
Nicko, Spag' Solo (spaghetti with pesto, egg and cheese) apparently learnt from
his student days (those of you that know Nicko will understand there couldn't
possibly have been any student days).
It is the only dish he can cook and fortunately is
delicious.
Unfortunately later in the
morning the engine had to be fired up as the wind dropped down to zero. We
chugged along under motor for about 3 hours then the breeze came back. This
time it was aft of the beam - a chance for the spinnaker to go
up.
Once the blue beauty
was filled we started flying at 9.5 knots towards our
destination.
After about 20 minutes Andy
spotted that the guy (rope that pulls the pole end of the spinnaker in) was
bending a stanchion, we decided on a plan to swap over to an inside guy by using
a climbing ascender attached to the old guy, however the grip on the
ascender proved too powerful, stripping the guy of it's outer rope
skin.
Ouch....
v.expensive.
Charlie, Dave and Nicko
dashed to the front to haul in the spinnaker. The wind had gone forward of
the beam now so it was Genoa (white sail) time anyway.
We flew along at 9 knots
for the rest of the day and into the black of night.
Just before dinner
we received our positions from World Cruising - 4th in class and 11th
overall (that's over the water not on handicap). The good news was that we
caught up 20 miles on Charliz and La Royere in the 24 hour run. Considering that
when we made the decision to go for the North route they we're already 135 miles
ahead we were pleased. Both boats neck and neck were just 54 miles ahead and we
could feel with at least 6/7 days to go we had a chance!
Simon rustled up
"Chilli con-carnie ala mama"( we had a email a few days ago from Simon's brother
ensuring us that there was no way Simon had learnt to cook from his mother and
that he had a secret stash of Dolmio sauces under his bunk).
It was all washed washed
down by another fantastic bottle of Rioja.
As we settled down to our
watches the wind was blowing 20 knots, we were on a broad reach at a speed of 9
knots and we were going for it!
Finally we've had loads of
brilliant emails, we love getting them, they're the highlight of our day and
distract us from each other. Keep them coming, but please don't be upset if we
don't respond, the sat phone costs us a fortune and therefore we try to keep the
outgoing mails to a minimum.
Nowcrew
out.