Race 1 - Day 9
Crew Diary - Race 1, Day 9: Liverpool to Punta del Este
28 August

Jon Milne
Jon Milne
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A day of mixed fortunes for CV30: broken, grey and wet somewhere a little way off the coast of Portugal. Antonia and Ed served breakfast in the galley with the Off Watch weak and bleary-eyed, and the On Watch aching for bed. The morning itself was relatively uneventful as we continued to make our way south downwind under spinnaker. Whilst this happened our two sail repairing Trojans, Simon and Tessa, continue their work to restore us to a full suite of sails.

Solar showers have been rigged on the stern of the boat and some of the crew made use of these. I'm sorry to report your correspondent did not get the opportunity to test these however the reports he received were very positive. We also have the added option in bathing in rainwater collected in sails, as demonstrated by Ray earlier in the week. Apparently this is very good for the complexion.

Much of today was spent either raising or lowering spinnakers with varying levels of success. Once a spinnaker is lowered, we tie wool around it before we it is hoisted again. I suspect we probably used several sheeps' worth in doing this. Watching how we deal with this, you can see the crew and Andy moulding together as an effective team with both watches working together where needed.

In addition to the fun with spinnakers and halyards we also took apart one of the winches today. With Mark, Ray, Ian and myself we took apart one of the larger primary winches. I'm happy to report that we assembled said winch with no parts either falling in the water or being left over.

We continue to travel towards the Equator.