|
The Shipping Blues
http://20six.co.uk/joemulvey
powered by
20six.co.uk
|
ode to tony
We are pootling along at a fairly pedestrian rate of knots heading towards
the Bay of Biscay. The nearest land is, tantalizingly, Ireland – about
630nm to our North-East. Sadly our destination is not Cork, but a small
and obscenely wealthy tax-haven just off the Breton coast. Jersey is
currently still more than 850 miles away. The weather forecast doesn’t
look fantastic for the next few days – either very little wind, or breeze
on the nose – but we still have high hopes of an early weekend arrival,
perhaps clinching that crucial 10th place.
On board, life is fairly tame. The wind and sea-state are (too) benign, so
deck work is fairly humdrum, enlivened only by the occasional peel.
Helming is dull, and spinnaker trim is never particularly interesting at
the best of times. The best that can be said is that we are topping up our
tans. Those of you planning to meet us in Liverpool had better break out
the Hawaiian Tropic.
The only incidents of note have been a couple of whale sightings, which
are always popular with the punters. The first one (a pilot whale was the
consensus guess) was very close, not much more than a couple of boat
lengths. The second (this morning) was a bit further away, but treated us
to some enthusiastic spouting. I don’t know why the sight should gladden
the heart so much, but it does.
In other news, we have celebrated probably the last boat birthday of our
trip. Tony Russell is one of our oldest crewmembers, turning 59 yesterday
(Sunday). I’ll confess right here and now that Tony is one of my favourite
fellow crewmembers, and I’m sure many of the others would agree. It’s not
just that he is a great engineer (he single-handedly keeps our generator,
water-maker, electrics and plumbing alive). It’s more that he has an
incredibly calm, pleasant, and unflappable manner.
Looking through our photos from the trip (some of which will eventually
make their way on here, I hope), one recurring image is Tony’s ready, open
grin. We get to see it every day, and it’s a real tonic. Our trip around
the world together will end in a couple of weeks’ time – I have hugely
enjoyed his company throughout, and hope that we will sail together again
in the future.
|
|
|
circumnavigation
Well, I’ve been circumnavigised. The operation was long and painful, and
carried out with a 68 foot Clipper, but I’m hoping that my quality of life
will be much improved in the long run.
Well, of course, technically we aren’t done yet, but we have crossed 38
degrees West, which was roughly our most westerly point on the outbound
trip across the Atlantic (to Salvador in Brazil). Consequently, we have
now crossed all lines of longitude. However we are saving the real Globe
Mitzvah until Liverpool. That’s not very far in the future – scheduled
arrival there is two weeks from today. Ooooooh, goosebumps.
Sailing proceeds in fairly humdrum fashion. The weather has been very
benign: warm, sunny, moderate breezes, reasonable sea-state. We have been
making decent headway with 200+ mile daily runs. The good news is that we
still have a nice current helping us, to the tune of one or two knots,
generally. Unfortunately, so have most of the others in the fleet, so our
position remains in the challenging half of the table.
But again, that’s a matter of our geographical position: we just haven’t
been where the wind is. Our sailing and deck work remain OK and we are
performing well against Durban who are physically nearest to us.
The only drama of note in the past three days was a snap-shackle that blew
on our spinnaker guy sending one corner of the sail flying off with the
wind. Seconds later, bodies swarmed on deck, and the sail was recovered
quickly and without fuss. It didn’t even get wet. It was flying again
twenty minutes later.
In fact, the only reason I find the incident noteworthy is that I reckon
it would have been hugely stressful eight months ago, with lots of
screaming and swearing, a ripped kite and a three-page blow-by-blow
description in this blog. Now, the crew machine works, although I am more
pushed for decent material to write about these days.
The most difficult aspect of this race remains our short-handedness. The
changeable wind, and the state of our mid-weight, mean we frequently have
to peel spinnakers (a simultaneous hoist and drop manoeuvre). It’s labour
intensive, and normally means waking up members of the off-watch to help,
depriving them of sleep. Everyone is being very good about it, but there
is a palpable air of weariness about the boat. I called a peel yesterday
just before 6am as we were looking forward to four glorious hours in our
bunks. Instead, we spent one hour doing the peel and packing the kite.
Even I hated me for that one.
Little else of note has happened. The wildlife are hiding, apart from the
odd dolphin. We did pass a discarded dan-buoy in the water yesterday –
hopefully just accidentally washed off deck as ours was in the Pacific.
Otherwise, it was a relic of some man-overboard disaster on another boat –
a reminder that it can happen. These are pretty much the waters where ABN
Amro II lost a crewmember two months ago.
Still, it’s unlikely that it will happen to us in these conditions, unless
someone does something really stupid, like climb out to the pole without a
harness on. Oops, I did that yesterday. Fi welcomed me back on deck with
the words “You stupid, stupid bastard.”
OK, I’ve ticked that box. Halyard and harness from now on, mum. It would
be a shame to go over the side, just as I win my Round-The-World badge.
|
|
|
Dangerous Waters
It’s amazing what a night’s sleep can do. I was on Mother Watch yesterday,
and my consequent eight hours of sleep afterwards had me bouncing up onto
deck this morning, with what must have been an annoyingly breezy
enthusiasm.
All of a sudden, I’m interested again. The sailing remains a little tame –
I think the last time we reefed was when we were heading up to Jamaica –
but that could change PDQ. As it happens, we are in waters that have a
fairly savage history. We have just passed through the southern end of the
Grand Banks, off Newfoundland, which will be familiar to anyone who has
read the book (or seen the film) “The Perfect Storm”. It’s the graveyard
of countless fishing vessels. It was one of the great fishing areas of the
world before over-exploitation ruined it: its riches may have attracted
fishermen from Europe and contributed to the discovery of the New World
long before Columbus. So, historically, it’s a pretty interesting area
too.
From more recent times, about 75 miles to the south of us right now lies
the wreck of Harland and Wolff’s pride and joy, the Titanic. And yes, that
means that icebergs are possible here, even at this time of year, although
the weather is warm right now. The surprising thing is that we are only at
about 43 degrees North, about level with Northern Spain, and rather south
of the UK.
The combination of cold water coming from the Arctic (bringing the bergs)
and warm water from the Gulf Stream produces the fog for which the Banks
are infamous, and through which we sailed for most of today. We were
rarely able to see more than a few boat lengths in any direction, although
we could look straight up and see the contrails of aircraft at 30,000 feet
above us. I was a little less stressed by our lack of radar here than when
we were off New Jersey – it’s a big ocean and we would be unlucky to hit
anything, but a working radar would have been a comfort.
The racing continues to be a bit frustrating. We are holding our own
against Durban who are in the same air, but the boats further north have
clearly had better wind and have stretched ahead of us. But we have been
sacrificing the goats to the Gods of Evil Winds, and hopefully the
situation will reverse. I remain very happy with how we are doing with the
wind we have – we just need a bit more.
In any case, I’m having a bit more fun than I was a few days ago, so
ignore that rather morose blog. I’m pretty stunned that it’s already the
12th of July – less than three weeks left – so I don’t really have time to
be gloomy. But it does seem that all the Round-The-World crew are pretty
tired. We are not quite all the way there yet, but I can confidently
report that it does seem like a bloody large planet.
|
|
|
Noo Yawk
On shore, in New York. It's great here, of course. I know quite a few people in town here, both from work and from university, and meeting them all has been great. We depart across the Atlantic on Wednesday morning - our last ocean leg. There isn't too much more to say about the race from Jamaica to here. We sailed OK, but we got stuck in behing Qingdao, and couldn't crack them, so Conor made the decision to gybe inland. It didn't work out: we lost wind and current and saw ourselves slip down to 9th place. It made for a frustrating trip in. The only drama was a foggy evening two nights before we got to port. The problem is that our radar is not functional at the moment, so we were reliant on foghorns and our eyes. With visibility down to four or five boat lengths, that wasn't great, especially as we could hear foghorns blowing nearby. The next day we heard that two local fishermen had been killed in a collision with tugboat in the same fog. Not good. I was on Mother Watch with Tony as we came in. It was a pretty easy day, really. winds were frustratingly light, so I'm quite glad I wasn't on deck. Our night-time arrival - past Brooklyn, the Verrazzano Narrows and the Statue of Liberty - was predictably thrilling. We are berthed in a prime location very close to the former World Trade Centre site. I'm looking forward to this next race. It's our last ocean. It could be quite bouncy, but it will be good to have a bit of a tough one before a very short race back from Jersey to Liverpool. And then we are done. Strange thought.
|
|
|
Fun with Yachts
Blogging a day late. I must be having fun.
Judge for yourselves.
Well, the good news is that we are racing, rather than chugging along with
a hot, noisy engine disturbing the tranquillity of the saloon. Other
things are disturbing the tranquillity of the saloon, but we'll get to
that later.
We are also out of the Caribbean and firmly in the bosom of the Atlantic,
about 450nm to the east of Florida. I reckon I can see Cork on the
horizon.
So, after my last entry, we had another half day of puttering along
stinkboat stylee. This time we managed to keep up with the rest and made
it to the swim party at the next rendezvous.
As swim parties go, it was a bit fraught: a combination of ocean swell,
current and breeze gave us a sharply practical lesson in why it's a bad
idea to fall overboard, especially without a lifejacket. But all bodies
were recovered safe and refreshed.
Soon after that, the decision was taken to restart. It's safe to say that
it caused a bit of consternation in the fleet. Everyone wants to race, but
no-one wanted to be late into a short NY stopover with an insanely
compressed shore time. This is one of the big "attraction" stops, and
people want to enjoy it. With winds still light-ish, there were concerns
we would not make the schedule under sail.
However, happily we all appear to be going just fine, knocking out a
steady 9-10 knots on average, which will do the job.
The start itself (at about 4:30pm) was "Le Mans" style - a mid-ocean
line-up (co-ordinated by Conor) with a mad rush to hoist sails and get
under way. We did OK, but lost ground during the night, possibly because
nudged a bit eastward and didn't put the spinnaker up.
That was rectified the next morning when put up the 1.5oz, bore away a
little and ramped up our speed by a knot or two.
Flying spinnakers is hard work, especially the helming, and we are
suffering a bit from staff shortages in that department. We lost two
Round-The-World crew in Jamaica: Beccy Lock and John Kelly, both from my
watch. Becs misses this race due to a bereavement, but hopefully re-joins
in NY. John suffered an ankle injury in Victoria which now requires
surgery: he will miss the rest of the trip. They are both excellent,
steady helms. Additionally, I rate Becs as the best all-round sailor in
the crew, by some margin.
To replace them, I have Mark Sutcliffe (who was with us across the
Pacific) and Paul Simmons, a fresh face who is joining us for the trip
home to his native Liverpool. They are both strong, and keen as mustard,
but just need some helming experience.
But hell, read back to the early instalments of this blog - I'm just about
starting to discover the relative positions of my arse and my elbow
myself. So we are getting on with it, and doing fine. We had good, steady
helming all day yesterday, a flawless peel to the 2.2 oz yesterday
evening, an uneventful night, another flawless peel back to the 1.5oz this
morning, and good speeds all the while.
And then, naturally, the spinnaker ripped.
The 1.5oz has just taken too much of a beating over the last nine months.
We were well within spec, in benign conditions. Conor was on the helm, I
was taking the opportunity for a quick cup of coffee, and then it just
went bang. Mayhem, pulling, winching, yelling, mast climbing, getting
battered around - you've heard it all before.
Still we got all the bits back in, and hoisted the 2.2oz fairly quickly.
So now, Mary and Lisa have another kite repair to do. Frankly, I'd be
inclined to say "Stuff it", take the bloody thing to NY, send it to a sail
loft, and take a penalty. We are not realistically playing for a podium
position any more, and I think they deserve a stress-free last few weeks.
But, as you probably know by now, Ms Duggan is made of steelier stuff than
I. So she and Lisa are currently ensconced in the saloon, festooned with
thread, tape, Dacron, and several hundred square metres of trashed kite.
Heroines.
So, am I having fun? Well, I can't really say that, while the girls slave
away in the sail sweatshop, but I was up until that point. I'm a bit more
relaxed about the sailing now, and with less than five weeks to go I don't
intend to get stressed.
So the plan is: get to New York fast, enjoying what's left of the sailing,
while dispensing copious amounts of tea and shoulder rubs to our
needle-and-thread crew. Then, re-acquaint myself with a few chums from
Barclays Capital New York, and a few others in the Big Apple.
And then the Atlantic, a charming little boutique ocean which will make
for a bit of a final giggle before Liverpool.
Time for some fun.
|
|
|
caribbean cruises inc.
Mother Watch over. It was a pretty easy one, as we are still motoring in
an airless, glassy sea. It was doubly easy, as Derek (my MW partner) is a
bit of a galley autocrat. I just chopped what I was told to chop, and
washed dishes.
The boredom of chugging along under diesel power aside, it was a lovely
day. Cuba passed mistily to our port side, but we saw little of it. As
advertised, we passed reasonably (but not too) close to Guantanamo Bay. We
elected not to stop for our free souvenir orange jumpsuit, leg irons, and
Abu Ghraib quiz book.
There is a fair bit of debris in the water - branches, driftwood, the odd
whole tree. I was a bit puzzled at first, but then I remembered that
Hurricane Alberto swept through here a couple of weeks ago. He clearly
left his mark. I imagine it would have been exciting sailing through that..
We were a bit behind the fleet for most of the day as our fuel transfer
pump broke during the night. That's what passes for variety on our boat,
when a pump other than the injector fails. Anyway, Tony Russell sacrificed
a small goat, or whatever he does to fix these things, and the Gods of
Diesel Mayhem were somehow appeased. But we lost a couple of hours.
The rest of the fleet didn't seem to mind. We caught up with them a little
while ago, all parked in calm water, having a swim party, which promptly
stopped as soon as we arrived. Now we are back in convoy, heading past the
Turks and Caicos for a rendezvous in the Bahamas tomorrow, where we will
again assess the possibility of a race start.
It's either a great cruise spoiled, or a sad excuse for a yacht race.
Either way, I wish we could make up our minds: swim parties and Bahama
stopovers, or racing?
|
|
|
jamaican in new york
Not quite, but I'm heading there.
The spectators on shore in Port Antonio were treated to an exciting race
start today, as the 10 Clippers battled it out to a windward mark (Cardiff
rounded first) before heading North-East towards the passage between Cuba
and Haiti.
As soon as we got out of sight of shore we dropped the headsails and put
on the engine. It was all just for show. The wind was forecast to be too
light to make speed, so we are motoring for at least 24 hours to look for
wind.
Still, it was fun while it lasted. And the motoring allows us to get some
issues under control.
Yet again, it was a rush to get away. The engine replacement part only
arrived late on Thursday night, so we only just got fixed up in time for
our 11am departure. It was all a bit stressful - the low point being when
I realised we had run low on sunscreen, ran into town to get some, and got
thrown out out of the shop because I wasn't wearing a shirt. Don't these
people realise who I am, for God's sake?
The final few days were pretty enjoyable, though. We had prizegiving on
Tuesday night. The prizes were given out by Mrs Errol Flynn (we were
berthed at the Errol Flynn Marina). Despite being about ninety, she was
clearly rather disgraceful, and looked as if she still made a habit of
seducing Hollywood stars.
We were due to host a beach barbecue jointly with Western Australia on
Wednesday night, but torrential rain put the kibosh on that, so a quiet
night was had.
I got some diving done on the coral reef offshore on Thursday morning,
before getting stuck into boat stuff, mainly storing victuals. It dragged
on a bit, but we got as far as we could, before calling it a night. Most
of us dined at a tiny Rastafrarian shack which doesn't advertise called
Dickie's Best Kept Secret. Needless to say, absolutely everyone knows
about it. The food was good, fresh and simple.
And then, our busy morning, and race start. We are heading for a
rendezvous point in the Windward Passage, about 120 miles away at the time
of writing. That's the strait between Cuba and Haiti. Nearest place you
might have heard of? A little inlet called Guantanamo Bay.
We will pass about 40 miles offshore of it. If I haven't posted another
blog in the next couple of days, call Amnesty International.
|
|
|
[first page] [previous page]
[next page]
|
