The fleet has seen rapid progress throughout the past couple of days with boats averaging anywhere from 10.6kts to 14.4kts across six-hour time periods. Yesterday the four packs merged into two with PSP Logistics, Yacht Club Punta del Este and Dare To Lead joining the southern party and Bekezela and Washington, DC making significant gains to join the front of the northern pack. We currently find ourselves at the front of the southern pack with Qingdao leading our Northerly counterparts.
It’s been great fun the last two days with Champagne sailing conditions allowing us to get new crew on the helm and some lovely white sails sailing at high speeds which has been great for both speed and sleep. My only slight sadness of the white sailing is that poor Nico looks lost without a spinnaker to trim in his hand!
Some retained Leg 7 crew have also had the opportunity to get on the helm in more challenging conditions, with special mentions to Shayne and Liz for their continued improvement behind the wheel.
The mood on board is one of the best I’ve felt and I’m sure this is in no small part down to the lack of being close hauled. I spoke (un-seriously) a year or so ago with one of the Training Skippers about setting up a hypothetical sailing adventure company where you don’t have a destination but instead, you set sail with the strict instructions to not go closer than 70 degrees to the apparent wind. I’m sure that’d be very popular with a lot of Clipper Race crew but could also lead to a very long time on the water. As long as the boat’s air conditioned, I’m sure they wouldn’t mind!
Ha Long Bay, Viet Nam was the first boat to pass the same longitude as our second port, Punta del Este in the early afternoon today which made all of our circumnavigators...circumnavigators! It’s just another massive milestone ticked off this race and one they should be extremely proud of. Congratulations in no particular order to Paddy, Jaci, Eric, Adrian, Vicki, Ross, Olaf and Oli our fantastic team of round the worlders. It’s a testament to their characters that they’re still hungry to push the boat hard so that is what we’ll continue to do.
Hooroo cobbers,
Cam, Bob and the Ha Long Bay team