So first thing I check out and get all my luggage down to the dock in Antigua and onto my new boat Southern Child, this is a First 40.7 that the previous owner Jamie has tuned for racing, it's only 2 years old and used to be Smile and Wave.... Which last year won the Heineken Regatta in its class. So, no pressure!!!!
Once done with preparing to leave, we hop on board and start to head out. Once into open water I get the chance to take the helm.... Marcus is sleeping off another late night!!! It's good to be back behind the helm, I looking forward to just sailing now and this boat is just a dream if I am honest, turns on a penny as they say so it's hardly any effort what so ever.
We stop in Jolly Harbour up the coast of I hand over my passport and the skippers head to customs to play crew tennis, moving people between the various 3 boats being delivered to St Maarten for racing. We load and unload whatever is or is not required for racing and head to the pool for a swim and dinner. It's about 7pm by the time we leave finally for an overnight sail to St Maarten.
It's a pleasant night, not too cold and nice to helm through the night and enjoy a good easy sail. There is hardly any wind, and under white sails reaching the boat is doing between 7-8 knots which is pretty good. I'm excited to race on her, this will be fun.
St Maarten, Simpsons Bay is the destination and the problem here is that there is a bridge into the Marina which opens daily, coming in and going out so timing is everything. We don't want to be too early and sit around, but more important you don't want to be late and miss the bridge at 9!! We get there about 8... And there are a few familiar faces already around. Scarlet Logic belonging to Ross, a beautiful red hulled oyster and Lancelot II with Jacko at the helm... So cool he doesn't even take his wheel cover off to sail!! Haha
Not so long after we arrive EH01 and Northern Child are behind us and we are soon told by the marina we can't enter the gate till 11am despite having booked in advance! This is typical Caribbean. So, we all ignore that and barge in at 9 anyway... Now we potter around the marina, trying to avoid running out of water as we go. Marcus manages to get a cup of tea from Skylarke of London also waiting in the Marina, we pinch a few rolls too and have a quick breakfast cheese and ham roll... Well needed at this point.
Then we dock, finally... Not without a little scrape between northern and southern child.... No major damage thank goodness. Skippers head to customs again and we are all checked in to St Maarten on yet another beautiful sunny day.
Saturday, 9 March 2013
Posted with Blogsy
Thursday, 7 March 2013
Rest day in Antigua
Next day the guys return my dresses thankfully still in one piece, although I am still debating if I would ever wear them again!! It's a nice relaxing day off for me today, and apparently the rugby is on England vs. France. So I head to meet the last of the crew still in town and grab a drink at the yacht club settling down for some six nations rugby. Thankfully England win, we have a few French in and the rivalry across the bar is fun to watch along with the game.
In the evening some of the crew turn up that will be joining me in the Heineken Regatta in St Maarten, and will be sailing up with us tomorrow. Northern Child, Southern Child (my next boat for racing on) and EH01 will be making a convoy up to St Maarten in the morning. Vadmin and Tony (both from NYC) join us at the club and we all arrange dinner at Trappa's for that evening.
Food is good and everyone gets up to make a speech one at a time, have to say I think we are the loudest people in here. We are occassionally joined by Louis who works for RORC and breaks out into Rugby songs in light of our victory over France and "ou est la papier" rings out across Falmouth Harbour as the guys join in... All in all a fun end to a great racing week and a farewell to Antigua, although not long before I will be back again!!
Tomorrow morning we will be sailing for St Maarten, and the next set of racing with a new crew.
Results day and party
So after getting in at midnight, we have all headed out for some drinks... Well some of us, Gareth started off drinking but the pub crawl some became a sleep walk!! After the "guns" show, where the crew took off their shirts and flexed their muscles.. Ahem... !! And a bit of a dance at Abracadabra's we would pick him up and move him along to the next bar as they each shut... Till we were all left on the dock, drinking as the sun came up. It was a fun night, and we all deserved a well earned rest after that. I basically slept until 5pm and got up just in time for the race results party.
Getting ready to head down I hear shouting from outside and Marcus and Gareth banging down the door. Having lost a bet with Northern Child for podium they have to find dresses, and it would appear I have 2 with me... So I hand them over and let them get ready, not sure I will ever be able to wear these again but it's worth it for the show! Also, a little traumatised when I realise they both went commando...
Not all the crew are out as some pretty much couldn't wait to get off the boat the minute we got in. We came 5th overall in the end, so no podium for us but Northern Child are up there. The prize giving is at the Yacht Club, everyone is tucking into drinks and watching as the prizes are given out. The key prize being the Super Maxi Yatch the last one, this is when a surprise happens and Marcus and Gareth take to the stage in their dresses to pick up the prize. There are a lot of confused faces and the MC for the event quickly says "don't give anything away just yet" as he realises this isn't the crew that won!!! Not sure Gareth was aware of that as he seems convinced he did win it!! Finally they head off stage, to plenty of cheers and laughter... Followed by the real team coming to get their trophy.
Formalities over its time for some live music and dancing, all in all a great night and fun times had by all. time for the burger from Life on the Corner, the one I was thinking about every day till we got in... Yummy!
RORC Caribbean 600
Race day has finally arrived, I haven't been offshore racing since the Sydney to Hobart in 2008, but the memories of the reality of it are still there. Just to be clear, offshore racing is no holiday it's hard work, pretty tough and not everyone's cup of tea.
We meet at the dock at 8.30am, race start is 11am for our class but we need to get out earlier for all the formalities before the countdown to the final gun! I arrive with my small bag of essentials, my wet weather gear a bit lighter for the Caribbean than for the Hobart, but essential. Fleece... Just in case, thermals, quick dry shorts, deck shoes etc. wet wipes, sunscreen, deodorant, toothbrush and toothpaste.. And head torch for night sailing and tea making, got my new little petzl torch which I love (after all I am a geek and love a gadget).
Andy has picked up the newly repaired spinnaker and we prep the boat and are good to go by 9.30am. Quick crew departure picture and we are on our way. First things first, sail number on the side of the boat so the race committee know who we are (this is only because the mainsail is down, and that shows our numbers normally). Everyone on deck in life jackets another formality, for obvious reasons. In the Caribbean at least if we fall in we won't freeze to death in the water... At least not straight away! Plus this course is pretty close to the islands. I have uploaded a picture of the route.
We are split into two watches of 6 with Andy as skipper floating and grabbing sleep whilst he can. Our watches are organised, I'm with Brian, Jeff, HP, Marcus and Clifton on bow, shifts start at 6pm 3hrs on 3hrs off through the night till 6am then 4hrs on 4hrs off and so on. Life jackets on from 6pm and a tether attaches you to the boat so you don't slide off in the night!
We get our 30min warning from the committee, and the countdown starts with jostling for position. There are about 30+ boats starting with us and the big boats like Leopard starting 30mins later. It's a bit chaotic, but enough distance to avoid any near misses. Upwind start so we are short tacking, we get a great start off the mark ahead of the main competition and are flying up the coast... Quick tacks and lots of activity.
We continue with a good lead through the day as we get to Barbuda, round Nevis, up to Saba, St Barts and up to St Maarteen. We roll into our shifts nicely and it's all going pretty smoothly from a race standpoint... with just one exception, there were are those on the boat who literally had no idea how to use the toilet when an automated flush is taken out of the equation... As a result we all suffer the consequence as the "heads" as they are called and now flooded. When you are racing upwind with the boat heeled over at a 45 degree angle slamming into waves its really not a nice experience to go through, but sadly there isn't much you can do other than live with it for now.
Still hiking out we tuck into our boil in the bag delights for the evening Lamb Hot Pot and rice... Lovely. Again cooking upwind is a challenge, nothing like a quick tack in the middle of serving up!! Have to say the food has improved dramatically over the years. Can't say I will ever forget the middle sea race boil in the bag dinners, think in some ways they are still repeating on me!!! These thankfully are pretty good, and low calorie... It's like being on a diet at about 300 calls per pack.
Next morning as we start the run to Guadaloupe Andy tells us we are in 2nd place, everyone is keen to hold the lead so we roll off shifts and all get stuck in at the rail hiking out... It's amazing how much time difference this can get you. Another day passes and into the night we are truly racing and keeping an eye on the competition. Next morning about 8am we hit Gaudeloupe... And right then we hit a wind hole and come to a grinding halt. Practically going backwards, we sit desperately looking for some lift or wind around us, any boats moving. About a couple of hours of doing about 0.5knots Marcus spots a problem, a tear in the mainsail... Quick smart we need to fix it, bad enough we aren't going anywhere but without a main we have no chance!
We get the sail down on deck, start the repairs, sadly before we finish we start to pick up some wind. Sailing on just a jib, genoa or foresail (in sailing we have a few different words for the same thing, confusing is an understatement if you haven't done this before) we do what we can but at this stage we have lost about 5hrs, whilst others who went further inshore managed to keep sailing... It's all tactics! Finally the main is up and we are trying as hard as possible to gain back as much time as we can, if we have any chance of gaining time we need to get on the rail so it's looking like no sleep!!!
Round Gaudaloupe finally, heading back to Barbuda and onto Redonda before charging for the finish line upwind again!!!! Sadly the finish line is a bit of a mystery to find, not uncommon a problem but a pain in the neck, losing more time we could do without. Finally it's spotted and we are done, we finish on Thursday at 00.03.317 no idea of our position but glad to be done.
It's been a real challenge, dehydrated, tired, lacking sleep, bruised, we arrive on the dock and are greeted with a case of beer and photographer from RORC. A quick pack up of sails, clean of the deck and it's time to go for a well earned drink! During this race there have been some actual tears shed as some didn't really know what had hit them, a few strange occurrences and a very wet boat!
One memory would be whilst I was cooking up boil in the bag chilli we hit a massive wave... I know this because a hatch was accidentally left open that came into the galley and I had a bit of an unexpected shower..! Another, which will teach me to lie down... I was in my full foul weather gear, cold, and tired... Lay back for a minute the only part of me uncovered was my face peeping out of my waterproof jacket hood and just as I do this a big wave rolls over the deck right into my face... Seeping all down into my clothes beneath... Bugger!
I did also learn about a great app... Stellarium, sadly not available in the UK. You can take a picture of the sky and it will tell you what you see and where you are, and other cool stuff for star gazing. One of the things you see most is shooting stars on night sailing, and phosphorescence or luminous plankton as the boat sails through the water at night when the moon has set. We saw dolphins too on our trip one of the highlights of being becalmed for 5hrs!!
Tuesday, 26 February 2013
Final preparations before the big day...
So now with a full crew we head up for the final morning sail, nothing major just getting things a bit slicker and maybe try a headsail peel or two. This is our last to chance to practice now before we leave tomorrow morning for the race. It's also Clifton and Ambers only sail before we leave.
Things are going reasonably well upwind, headsail peels are ok and so we head downwind we hoist the heavy weight spinnaker. Within seconds Gareth is shouting back, it's torn get it down. Andy checks and as quick as we have raised it we drop it back down. It's not mean feat to tear this kite, so we now need to get in ASAP so we can get it back before race start. At this point Andy isn't going to risk anything else so sadly no more practice. No the best thing to happen, but that's life so we get back in.
The rest of the day is safety, tidy up pre-race, getting the right sails ready and fixing anything. We need to make sure any pointy sticking out bits are covered up!! That pretty much takes up most of the afternoon.
In the evening we head to the restaurant Life on the corner, all the bars and restaurants have free wifi here and every time we get to one everyone is phones out, heads down and checking Facebook or email. The Seabreeze cafe by the dock is nicknamed "FaceTime cafe" because all the yachting are face timing family and friends there day and night!!
Anyway, I order the mahi mahi from the grill.... Everyone else pretty much orders the burger, which I have to say is huge and looks pretty good. This is out last meal for 4 days, so you need a good one. From here on out its basically boil in a bag food, nuts, chocolate, bread and cheese.
The place is always busy, but it seems to also always be overwhelmed. So when everyone else gets served except me and I have to wait 90 minutes for it to arrive... Not impressed! I know this is the caribbean but this is a bit ridiculous, everyone else has finished.... I basically am sitting starving with food envy at the massive burger everyone is tucking into. I am literally about to walk out when it finally turns up, sadly not worth the wait... I eat and head home to rest before the race.
Monday, 25 February 2013
More Training... definitely needed
So day 2 of training and we are still two crew members down, Amber and Clifton a married couple again from New York as are quite a few of the current crew. We decide not to wait and that we need to make the most of time to train together. It's not going to be easy for the last 2 now as they will have practically no time to train with us, even though we will go out tomorrow morning the last thing you want to do before a big race is blow a sail or break anything!!!!
So we head out early and put in lots of manoeuvres, things seem to be getting better and the gybe's go much smoother than the previous day. Communication improves slightly, I have the hand signals sorted with Gareth on bow and that's working better than shouting or trying to hear over everything and everyone else. There's still the same dynamic in the group, not sure that will ever change really but the work gets done and that's what it's all about.
We make lunch on the boat, my turn so working with Joe we throw together some salami, cheese, tomato and salad wraps... Boat food is more practical than anything else! The crew seem to enjoy it, or at least are so hungry they will eat anything!!! Probably should have taken the skin off the salami though... Got a few comments about that! Oh well, I said "think of it as dental floss"!!
We sail back and briefly meet up with Clifton and Amber as they settle onto the boat. I head to get changed and back down to catch the end of the Pre-race party. Again, always 2 days before the race start as you don't want everyone hungover just before a big offshore race! It's free booze, buffet food, and a traditional Caribbean band called Itchy Feet I think!! Anyway, I just get there for the end and then we all head for dinner at the Admirals Inn.
Here I tuck into a nice steak dinner (not a patch on Argentina though), it's ok, limited choice here sadly compared to other restaurants but good quality. Some red wine and finished off with the introduction of a Bushwacka... Not had that before but have to say its a tasty cocktail!!! We head to the Mad Mongoose for a few drinks and then I head home. To be honest watching grown men compete to try and swing a hoop onto a hook at the back of the bar is a bit like watching paint dry... But they seem to love it, hmmmm .....
Race training day... Back in the pit
So now the sailing part of my adventure begins, I get my sailing kit on and head down to EH01 my boat for the next week of training and racing. My old home away from home I think I have sailed about 4000 nautical miles in her roughly and now will probably get in another 700 under my belt. It's and emotional reunion, many happy memories and amazing times have been made here.
Day one is always the same process, we go through safety and where everything is on the boat, life rafts, jackets, fire extinguishers and of course how to use the heads (toilet for those not in the know)!! Now that is the most important bit to pay attention to for anyone planning to sail... The heads and use thereof is the most contentious part of sailing with others.
We run through sailing experience to get an idea of who will be where to start with, and as expected I'm in the pit. To be honest if I hadnt got an injury with my wrist I would have jumped at the chance to be on the bow.... madness I know.... ! Anyway, I know the boat inside out and so it's a quick once over and I'm up to speed on where everything is.
Next we start to rig the boat for our afternoon sail whilst we wait for another crew member Brian to arrive. So of course most things are already in place so the main setup required is for the spinnaker. Hmmmm.... So maybe a few of you don't know the terminology so I will put up a glossary of terms to help!!!
Brian arrives and we get underway, it's a gorgeous day, hot, sunny and plenty of wind. As you can expect on the first day of training we aren't exactly a well oiled machine, it's pretty chaotic. I've been through this so many times I just take it in my stride and let the day unfurl. In a nutshell though, what generally happens with sailors of varying experience is a jostle where everyone thinks they know best, lots of people shouting and telling you what to do, no one listening properly to Andy (the skipper) ,communication is always appalling at the start. But we get sails up, and potter around we get the spinnaker up and do a couple of gybe's... Not pretty by any stretch of the imagination but I'm sure we will get there in the end.
So then on top of this as the only female (at the moment) on the boat there is always the sexism the top it all off. Those who know me can probably guess my feelings on being told what to do, and being spoken to in a patronising tone! Today we are 8 individuals trying to work out how to be a team.... Let's hope things improve before race day!!! Small blessing at least we didn't break anything!!
On a personal note I am very happy that my wrist injury makes it through the day, not saying its perfect but it's not getting worse! Not yet anyway... Having fallen down the stairs at home some 3 months ago, and torn tendons and ligaments my left wrist still isn't back to normal but it's too late now, I just need it to take a little punishment and then will rest again in Peru!
In the evening we head to Cloggys bar and restaurant in the Antigua Yacht Club for dinner and I tuck in to a fabulous chicken dinner... The food here is pretty good quality. Straight to bed from dinner, I'm still getting over carnival and sleep is much needed. Plus once we start the race sleep isn't going to really happen so the more I can get now the better.
I chat a little with Gareth who is Andy's apprentice and the bowman, have to say he's a pretty interesting guy. He was a scientist loved his adrenalin sports, snowboarding and the like and gave up everything to be a sailor! He's blogging too, www.gsailinglife.com... You should check it out!! I would bet there's a book there somewhere with his life changing experience.
As for the crew.... I am struggling a little really to form any relationships. Im getting to know them a little and asking questions, getting a response and then.... complete silence, it's a pretty one way conversation so far with some...! Early days though, so will see how it goes... As long as I'm sailing I'm happy!
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