Race 4 - Day 9
Crew Diary - Albany, Western Australia, to Sydney
10 December
This is a cold an inhospitable place, the Southern Ocean - approaching Tasmania we have hardly had a day without 45 knot winds, mostly on the nose, and the crew and the boat are showing the strain of constantly dealing with moving around with everything on the vertical without respite.
Not only the rail, but the whole guard rail is regularly under water as the waves crash through and the Mothers have done a spectacular job serving food and hot drinks.
It seems a long way from our little home from Home on Middleton Beach in Albany with our excellent restaurant next door serving great coffee from 7.30am and piano playing in the evenings! Race Start came very quickly and we are allowed to slip lines two hours ahead of the fleet to allow our new skipper some familiarisation. We agree an ambitious strategy for the Race Start around three marks in the King George Sound with Yankee 1 up and we will go for the kite hoist on the downwind run through the jibe mark (which is nearly on the beach to the west!) The Skipper asks me to helm the start, normally only the Skippers do this and I don't need to be asked twice! Helming these boats in close quarters is an awesome responsibility.
My son Matthew on Da Nang – Viet Nam notices and cheekily shouts across don't crash Dad! We get a clean start off the line and are soon in a tacking duel with Garmin and Visit Seattle up to the windward mark. The whole of the headland along Marine Drive is nose to tail cars of people who have turned out to witness the spectacle. As we round the mark there are only four other boats making a spinnaker hoist - can we make some ground? Alas our hoist, supplemented by a riding turn on a winch, means our hoist is not text book and we slip back. As we exit the bay LMAX Exchange is over the horizon and we set about getting back amongst the fleet. Slowly we overhaul boat by boat the back markers, Unicef runs well upwind. By Day 4 the schedule is showing us as high as fifth a few miles ahead of LMAX Exchange! There will be some puzzled Frenchmen staring at the schedule and the weather wondering how did that happen? Our crew have worked tirelessly and put in a magnificent effort.
The night of Day 7 will long be talked about by our crew. In a broad Lancashire accent our Skipper suggests it is going to be exciting, somewhat of an understatement as it turns out. We come on watch at 22.00 through to 02.00. Pitch black but we have the deck light on so we can see the bow movement and the waves. The wind is now moved back behind the beam and built to 45 knots true. We have the large Yankee and a reefed mainsail and are driving in a narrow wind angle of 95 degrees with massive waves picking the boat up from behind and surfing at up to 20knts. The waves try to spin the boat into a gybe or tack with great force and the helm is heavy with both rudders in the water if you stray more than 20 degrees from the slot.
The trick is to catch the boat as it crests the wave when the helm goes light and come off the wave straight and on course.
Sydney and friends and family cannot come soon enough!
Best wishes to all our families, crew and supporters.
Happy Birthday to Marta on board, and hope one of our greatest supporters Iban had a lovely birthday celebration too!
Wish you were here!
It is amazingly sunny today within 10 nautical miles of the coast of Tasmania and sailing in sight of Qingdao and IchorCoal. See you soon in Sydney!
Andrew.