Race 3 - Day 7
Crew Diary - Race 3 Day 7: Cape Town to Fremantle
07 November

“Are you having fun?” is probably the question I am most often asked by family and friends as I post my personal blogs each day, and I have to say that it is a very difficult one to answer.

The high points are fantastic and probably greater than I anticipated. The sheer elation of helming under spinnaker at 22 knots in big rolling seas and winds of 40 knots (as well as being very very scary at the same time!); the beauty of the the sky on starry nights without any lights around to interrupt your view; the awesome beauty of the deep ocean, a deep, deep blue; the birdlife, soaring and swooping effortlessly in what we would think of as a high wind; the wide open vistas of the ocean without sight of land or human influence or presence for weeks on end; the presence of dolphin “vapour trails” of phosphorescence alongside the boat on dark moonlit nights. I could go on.

The lows are probably also greater and more pervasive than I, being bear of little brain or imagination, anticipated. It is difficult to feel elated by any of the above when you are damp, everything around you is damp and shows no prospect of being dry for most of the rest of the race (even your dearest friend, your sleeping bag); when you have been on the same tack for several days, beating into the wind, the boat is well heeled over and just moving around the boat is hazardous and hard work and painful; when you are feeling seasick and others are too so that working the boat is awfully hard work because you are shorthanded. I have to confess that the sheer hard work of living on and racing a big ocean racer like this was something that I had not really got my head round, having never experienced it before this.

But the boats are great. We have never had any doubts about her ability to keep us safe and handle the conditions, even in the toughest of conditions. My relationship with it is however ambivalent as well. When it is planing along at 22 knots under the kite, she flies like a bird. When she is heeled hard over and kicking around, and the watches pass in remorse unrelenting routine and the generator seems to have been going endlessly like some background industrial process, it feels as though we are slaves to an unforgiving and demanding and demonic Beast!

So, am I having fun? Yes, I think so, although it is very hard work and not as unalloyed pleasure as my armchair anticipation hoped for. That said, it is an amazing experience and one that one could never experience in any other way. So the answer is probably Yes. Ask me in 2 years time when I look back on it and the mind has dampened the bad bits and hung onto the high points and the answer will undoubtedly be Yes!

In the meantime I hang onto the fact that I am sharing the experience with a great bunch of people. I really believe that I could not have been blessed with a better crew on each of the legs, and that helps us through even the darkest moments together. As a round the worlder that is a very important influence in my keeping going; yesterday I was intent on getting off at our next stop in Fremantle; now it is probably Sydney!

And on that note I send a shout out to Queen Elizabeth's Hospital in Bristol and particularly to Heather Mann's class.