Race 12 - Day 7
Crew Diary - Race 12 Day 7: New York to Derry-Londonderry
03 July

Well. One of the tasks we take turns with is “Nav” - sitting in the Navigation Station looking at the chart plotters and graphs which tell you the arcane details required for ocean racing – wind speeds and angles, true and apparent, water and speed over ground, velocities made good and even water temperature. All this data, plus weather and current data, allows the planners to plot the best route and the helms people to be informed of the best bearing to take and possibly the best sail plan for the moment. When we are near enough for them to be in range, we are also keeping a close eye on the other boats and ensuring they do not have the nerve to go faster than us and checking they are not seeking to outwit us with their sly tricks. It is a bit like being in mountainous terrain seeking to go from A to B using a map which varies every day but where there are many possible routes. Each Skipper thinks of the most likely route to succeed – so at any one point the fleet may be scattered over several hundred miles and all you can seek to be is first in your group. So far we have been doing this rather well but who knows whether the boats choosing different routes might not win in the end. It makes the Race Viewer exciting rather than informative.

Anyway “doing Nav” definitely feels like you are one of the grown ups and bellowing up to the helm that they need to bear up a few degrees for best effect gives an occasional illusion of power. Feeding back successes that they are drawing away from a boat behind adds to the general enjoyment too.

We have been sailing through quite unpleasant weather from time to time. Sea temperature dropped by over 10 degrees in one day. On a recent Nav duty I noted “Titanic Disaster” marked on our bit of the chart and realised we were also on the notorious Tail of the Bank (Perfect Storm). On deck we acted out bits of Titanic (not Perfect Storm – no-one wants to imitate hairy blokes gutting cod), some sang “My Heart Will Go On” and I being of an earlier vintage sang “Nearer My God to Thee”. We also did the Birdy Dance to try and keep warm. It was foggy and we kind of wanted to see an iceberg. But mostly didn't.

Down in Nav I was keeping an eye out for shipping and was as ever impressed by the courtesy of the sea. A large tanker, as soon as it came within electronic range of us made a clear course change to avoid the possibility of collision – from 7 miles away from us - and confirmed he knew we were around by a polite heavily accented radio call. Another massive container ship decided that 1.5 nm clearance was probably ok and held its course and on this occasion the radio call came from a very nicely spoken English lady (Home Counties?).

More prosaically I, Unicef's Victualler, would like to take this opportunity to refute the suggestion made in a recent Skipper Blog that we had run out of teabags. What we have a lot of is teabags. What we do not have a lot of is people who look in the teabag store to find them. Honestly. As if!

Alison Ryan