Race 5 - Day 17
Crew Diary - Race 5 - Day 17
08 January
Twenty Five degrees south
Dave Bouttell
When I last looked at the chart plotter coming off watch, we had gone as far north as twenty five degrees south. Our destination is at around twenty degrees south, Whitsundays Islands. About 750 kilometres to go, according to Jim’s mobile phone app. I’m amused he hasn’t altered the default system of measurement, as he is a USA citizen and all. One of the three last bastions of imperial measurement. It’s inevitable they change and the sooner the cheaper it will be. (Rant over but for the scrapping of nautical measurement and eventual metric standardisation).
Yesterday’s early morning watch was glorious with an almost full moon and a smooth sea. Colours of all the ropes were easily discernible under it’s bright light. The horseshoe lifebuoys on the A frame showing their true colours. We rode the tidal current at a steady rate, grateful for it’s travelator effect adding a bonus four knots to our progress. Only the brightest stars and planets were visible. The usual dark shapes in luminous stripes now recognisable as crew mates.
Today sees Bruce and me back in the galley on cooking and cleaning duty as Mothers. Breakfast done, heads clean, and the rat runs to the accommodation and sail locker smelling of good, and clean, and fresh. (Well almost). The bread is proving in the oven and long overdue a knock-back, is waiting for my attention. I somehow doubt it competes with both Larry and Stuarts creations as it’s destined to become ‘raw toast’ for the morning’s breakfast. The sweet layers of preservative making the final taste difference, in varying thickness often competing with the thickness of slice, balanced above.
We’re all excited about our pending arrival and the more I learn of the barrier reef as a natural wonder of our rock, the more eager I am to experience as much of it as at all possible. Steak is an enduring yearning.
Carrying an avian passenger in front of the main-sheet traveller, leading suspect, in the amputation of our windex, wind vane’s flight feathers now pointing as best as possible downhill instead of into the wind, in it’s abortive attempt at landing atop the mast. We watched as it stumbled about for balance, wings aloft to steady it, in the gentle rocking and rolling of Dare To Lead in the swell. I wonder if they too may suffer sea-sickness as we do. Could this have been a booby with it’s slender w shaped wings and longish tail. It left as the watch changed spending most of the watch within a metre of Steph. Why do they have this behaviour – landing on ships?
Skipper Guy, now an aspiring graphic artist, proudly displays to us his growing portfolio of position reports, of the fleet, with currents, wind and distance depicted, with each new schedule. Competitor’s boat speeds adjacent each named racing yacht icon, freehand drawn lines represent a contemporary, approximation of Australian coastline. We gloat briefly at achieving the fleets best speed hoping to weave ourselves into a more favorable finish position. We’re in stealth mode, in hiding, from all including ourselves until we next pop into view. <<Cue the Pink Panther music>>.
Hope to see more sea-life as we navigate inside the barrier reef.
Greetings to all family, friends, followers, sponsors, organisers and crew-mates around the globe from all aboard the good ship Dare To Lead.