Crew Blog

Settling in to life onboard

27 May 2008

For the round the world crew and those who have been on board Durban 2010 and Beyond since Qingdao or earlier, the Jamaica stopover was tantalisingly short but, having sorted out most of the maintenance and deep clean in Panama, they made the most of the two day stopover either bamboo rafting, visiting local beaches or just relaxing in the sunshine. For those of joining the boat for the last leg, Jamaica was a delight with the Jamaica Tourist Board, hoteliers and tour companies pulling out all the stops to ensure that we had a great time.

On leaving Jamaica, we initially had a race start that ultimately decided the line up for the Le Mans start - we got Durban into a great position and reached the windward mark in second setting us up nicely for the restart, after the overnight motor sail to Cuba to find more wind. It has taken us leggers a few days to settle into boat routines. For the last couple of days we’ve had some fairly lumpy seas and this has tested our sea legs (and stomachs).  After a squall which seemed to reverse all the positions of the fleet, we’re now playing catch-up. We’ve got Liverpool 08 and Uniquely Singapore in our sights and we’re not going to let them get away. New faces on the helm are learning as much as they can as fast as they can from the more experienced crew. What we leggers lack in experience, we’re making up for in enthusiasm. Hopefully the combination of skills will help us move up through the fleet. No dolphin sightings yet but we’re hopeful that Police’s Greatest Hits might be more to their taste!

Steph