The Race heads South
The race is on, we’re heading for cape Verdi islands with the scoring gate in our sights. We’ve been hitting a lot of wind holes since we blew our code 2 kite. I’m not so sure if those wind holes would have been there had we not diverted to Las Palmas, but we’ll never know. There appears to be two packs, Gosh, Qingdao, Punta, Seattle and LBS and the rest. We catch up at night and fall away during the day. The policy on board is to get as many people as possible up to speed with helming. It can be difficult during the day as there’s not much to hang your hat on and so compass and wind angle are the plan, but you can see the waves coming, so much easier to take the weather helm and keep the boat running straight. At night it’s a different story, you can’t see the waves coming and as we have a steaming light throwing out a reflection on the spinnaker (makes it easier to trim) and low cloud cover, it’s difficult to use the stars as a heading and so you’ve still got to helm on wind angle and compass bearing, no auto helm for us! It takes time to feel the boat and the waves rolling in from which ever side they come from. It is a real adrenaline rush and part of the reason I’m doing this. I’ve been surfing down waves at 18 knots and the waves aren’t that big yet. We are being conservative with our spinnaker choice, so use our code 3 at night and code 1 during the day as our Code 2 won’t be available until we repair it in Punta.
The process for changing the spinnakers is a lengthy one. We 1st hoist our Yankee sail in front of the spinnaker, which slightly masks it, thus de-powering it, blow the tack line (a method of automatically releasing the tack or the sail (the 1st connection point of the sail) then pulling the clue between the boom and the main whilst slowly easing the Spinnaker halliard, and pulling the bottom of the sail until we get the tack onboard and down into the galley, we then pull the rest of the spinnaker between the main sail and the boom down into the galley. This is commonly called a letter box drop, when done well, it’s like poetry in motion. We’re not quite there yet more like a limerick! We then reset our tack line, attached our code 3 to the tack line, sheets and halliard, hoist the code 3 in front of the Yankee and then drop the Yankee again, the idea is trying not to lose speed during the transition. But as you can imagine a mighty effort by a watch and the code 1 still needs to be woolled, which takes about 30 minutes down below. . (Wooling is the process we use to wrap the spinnaker up. We start at head and roll the sail edges into the middle, making sure the roll is tight, then we tie the role with short bits of wool every 30-40cm of the spinnaker, so when we raise the spinnaker again it doesn’t automatically fill until you put pressure on the clue, by grinding in the working sheet which pops the wool (quite the spectacle up close.)
We just get confirmation that CV25 has been given a 5.5 hour penalty for the advantage we had using our engines to drop Dave into Las Palmas. It’s a real kick in the teeth for the team and means there is no chance of picking up any points going through the gate and whilst we understand the principles of the sanction, we all feel a bit underwhelmed by the empathy and time taken to look after a teammate. It is what it is, and we can’t do anything about it now, it’s all about getting out in front of the pack by 5.5 hours of as many of the fleet as possible.
As we pass cape Verdi islands the heat begins to rise and we see more and more squalls, we’ve heard that other boats have suffered spinnaker damage and whilst we don’t wish any boat to have problems it helps knowing that it’s not just our inexperienced crew causing issues but also the weather that catches you out. We’re still seeing lots of flying fish and not much else.
We’re catching the fleet with some great sailing, blasting through the night with a well-balanced sail plan and knocking the competition down one by one, just GOSH out in front now as we head for the Doldrums.
Life in the Doldrums
Due to timings of the race and at port, clipper allow the fleet to motor part of the Doldrums and set out a corridor that the fleet must use. To use your engine, you must inform Clipper race committee 3 hours before you want to turn your engines on and you then are allowed 60 hours of time to motor 6 degrees of latitude, 1 degree is equal to 60 nautical miles so 6 degrees is equal to 360 nautical miles. You cannot pass the 6 degrees of latitude early, so sticking the engine revs up will not help as you’d have to hang around before passing that 6 degrees of latitude, however, you don’t have to go directly south, you can go sideways to exit the Doldrums corridor to give yourself a better wind angle into Punta, but once you’ve decided to motor, you can’t stop. This is where tactics come into the equation and trying to understand the wind maps we’re getting from clipper. Lots of different models, with as you might have guessed, lots of different outcomes!
We hit the Doldrums corridor in 2nd spot behind GOSH, the wind is still good and we carry good speed into the corridor, but inevitably, the wind eventually drops and we start “Bobingonaboat”. We call in our option to motor and we hardly move for 3 hours. It is very frustrating, but it is what it is. This is now the opportunity to recharge the crew, get some rest and repair the boat. The most pressing issue is our code 2 ripped to shreds just after the canaries. Sarah and Kerry get into action in separate watches to not only repair the sail but also train others in the process.
Before the race, during the prep weeks, I and others had taken the new sails to a park in Gosport, laid out the spinnaker and painstakingly, numbered every panel on each spinnaker, then mapped those numbers onto a sail plan, for exactly this scenario, a bit like a giant jigsaw.
This is how they now put it back together again. They start by using small strips of sail tape, a bit like butterfly stitches, along the rips, then cover the full rip with a wider patch of sail tape, turn the sail over and do the same on the reverse before stitching the repair patch with our sewing machine, now considering the sail covers some 300 square metres and the guys are working in the galley some 3 square metres, it’s quite a sight. It’s going to take many hours of work, but will get us in a lot better position to repair the sail, when we get to Punta, where Hyde sails are already preparing a new set of patches to help us finish the repairs.
We’ve had a number of issues with the grinders this race and the rear grinders have now stopped working in conjunction with the central grinders. This is one of my responsibilities, so all the covers came off and the main spline to the rear had disconnected itself from the main drive shaft. So yet again we have another thing we need to add to our running check list. All the grub screws on the gearing, splines and shafts had become loose. All back together and working fine, a good scrub out and all bolted back together for our run into Punta. We’ve also used the time to check all our rigging, Gavin’s gone up the mast to check all is in order and to take a few photos.
As we turn the engine off, and start to sail again, the weather has started to change. A lot of squalls, it’s still relatively warm, Steven is the 1st to move, swiftly followed by Kerry and I, we charge down below, strip off to our underwear, grab a towel and shower Gell, throw our lifejackets on again and get back up on deck for a fresh water shower, it was bliss. Probably the highlight of the week. All clean, down below, and a set of clean cloths. Great.
I’m back on Mother watch again, ably supported by Lisa from starboard watch, 3rd time lucky for me. Making breakfast, Lunch and Tea for 20 people in the middle of the Doldrums is, I suppose, a very rare thing, not done by many. We had cereal and freshly baked baguette toast with various hot drinks for breakfast, fairly simple, but in a bloody squall, in the middle of the Doldrums making toast at 45 degrees, you couldn’t make it up. Sure enough it calmed down after an hour or so. Then for lunch, sun dried tomatoes with onion and red peppers in couscous with garlic bread. Then for tea, Chorizo, black bean, corn & cheese burritos with rice pudding and jam for pudding. I thought we should have a pudding to celebrate turning our engines off at 19.00 and getting back to sailing. Hopefully the wind will be good enough and we’ll start to see whose strategy through the Doldrums has succeeded.
Simple Joys and Solved Mysteries
The teddies have mysteriously reappeared. Still in the dry bag i had left them in with the other things that had gone missing. But the bag was open and on the opposite side of the boat, where they had been stowed. The plot thickens and inter-pole have been duly notified for a full investigation upon arrival into Punta. It’s become a bit of a light-hearted joke within the crew, but for me, upsetting for some time and when you’ve not got much to think about, it overtook most other thoughts during the last two weeks. I don’t really care where they were or who had them, I’m just glad they’re back.
Sailing these boats is a fairly steep learning curve for the average sailor, and some of our crew have never sailed and dinghy, let alone a 70 ft ocean racing boat. Zoe has put together a couple of classroom sessions whilst where motoring on the basics of trimming, which has gone down well with the crew, but still work to do.
We exit our 6 degrees of latitude, all sails back up and a little wind coming from the south, so beating our way out of the Doldrums corridor. It’s difficult to tell where we are in the fleet as each boat has had different strategies. We’re still on the hunt, and it will take a few days to figure out who’s had the best Doldrums strategy.
Had another new friend land on the boat today, not too sure what it is, looks like a heron or a crane, but it’s knackered. Marcus has caught it and, it’s now in a covered bucket being fed tuna. We’ve called it Simon. We’ll see what condition it will be in the morning, hopefully, send it in its way.
Finally Sunday Sundown, another can of cold Fanta a few little canopies before tea and a team photograph for families and friends complete with the teddies. Another week done as we now move out of the Doldrums corridor and head for the next scoring gate.
Roll on week 5