Crew Blog

Pre-Race Diary - 15 September 2007

15 September 2007

Our week of frantic work (with a bit of play) in Liverpool is coming to a close with the start only a day away. Last night the entire fleet crews and family celebrated until the early morning hours in the Pan Am lounge, only a stone’s throw from all ten 68’s in Albert dock.  On the dance floor until early in the morning, Singapore crew danced with Qingdao, Hull& Humber, Western Australia, or anyone within reach. We compete with those boats, yes, but we’re finding a special pleasure in how the entire fleet works and plays together to get this race underway.

Every time a crew member arrived over these last few days, stepping off the dock and onto our boat laden with personal effects to last a month or perhaps even a year, it never failed to infused all of us already here with renewed sense of excitement (if that’s possible) and a deeper sense of the family we all are becoming.  Also, as the berths filled up, reality started kicking in that we are truly about to do what all of us have been planning and working towards for months and even years.

Someone commented that we find ourselves interacting usually only those we choose on other boats but on our own, everyone seems to genuinely enjoy our entire crew. As diverse as we all are in culture, background, and experience, our growing common pride in this boat truly makes us feel like we are the boat to be envied.

It’s become so clear to us now that no one person can fill every need, so the diversity of skill we’ve discovered to populate our crew gives us a good feeling about our potential.  Skipper Mark has sewn the seeds and we’re all very happy with the harvest.