Crew Blog

Tubes and Top Gun

01 November 2007

Salutations from NY Clipper,

After eight days at sea we have finally named the two watches: the former Port watch has been re-christened Top Gun after a late night session of ‘guess the quote’ revealed we all knew far too many TG quotes than was decent. In keeping with the Tom Cruise theme the former Starboard watch have been christened ‘Rain Man’ as whenever they go on shift the heavens open and as soon as Top Gun replaces them the sun re-appears.

We have also been being educated in Glaswegian by Duggie and Gordon but so far our vocabulary only stretches to one word: “tubes” (apparently an excellent way to describe the diabolical course we were steering at the time). Cultural differences are also being played out in the usual Anglo-American arguments over ‘z’ or ‘s’, ‘de brie’ or ‘debris’. Luckily we Brits still out number the Yanks (a very rare occurrence).

In other news, sadly we haven’t seen any nautical wildlife (apart from the giant sperm whale Nate was convinced was following us last night; on closer inspection it turned out to be the water lapping against the hull). A few pandas have been sighted below deck after a particularly sunny day. We also seem to be following the South Atlantic jetsam current and so far we have sighted a loo seat and a worker’s helmet.

Mother watch has turned into a bread-making competition, so much so that we would rival Hovis for variety. Just need to perfect pretzels and bagels and we will be laughing. Justyn’s unfortunate day bag included Brazilian spam cunningly disguised as corned beef and Brazilian breakfast cereal has been nicknamed ‘corn fakes’ and ‘worms’ which Hen finds surprisingly tasty (she was caught eating worms in her garden when she was young - need we say more).

Finally we raised a new ensign today: Bob’s clean pants. To be saluted as they will probably never be washed again on Leg 2.

We will miss the sun but the expected weather and heightened winds will provide an opportunity to break out sleeping bags, boots and fleeces. A very exciting proposal – simple things please simple minds on a 68-foot yacht.

Wind gods we remain your obedient servants,

Yours aye

Hen and Jen