Race 3 - Day 10
Crew Diary - Race 3 Day 10: Cape Town to Fremantle
10 November

Andrew Greenough
Andrew Greenough
Team Nasdaq
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Back to Cape Town – what an amazing stopover destination made all the better by the unexpected arrival of my wife Emma. If it wasn't for the Clipper Race, we'd never have seen wild penguins, ostriches, and baboons stealing carrier bags of food from tourists at the Cape of Good Hope National Park.

The Cape of Good Hope was a place I'd only ever drawn on a map at school and seen in an atlas. It's great to visit those places you only ever see on a map; and no we didn't fly there, we sailed there! How awesome is that! Next stop Australia.

So far Leg 3 has been tough with rough seas and a lot of up wind sailing. We also had torrential rain which stopped the windex (wind arrow and associated gubbins at the top of the mast). Fortunately, Phil (Henri Lloyd) Wilkinson having had his recent 28th birthday on board is now a salty old sea dog and can gauge wind strength and direction with his beard, I'm sure Sir Robin can be proud of him and they can share beard stories.

We also have brilliant photo for the Leg 3 photo competition; directed by myself and shot, produced and edited by Phil (Henri Lloyd) Wilkinson. Word has got back that it is already being used by Clipper Race media so see if you can spot it and vote for it – you'll want it on a poster! If we win the vote the Team gets £100 behind the bar so please vote as we'll all be proper thirsty by then.

With the weather calming down, the banter has reached a new high and Rob often sits quietly in the corner getting ideas for his Skipper Blogs, of which we can now predict the content of more accurately than the weather.

As I write this there is a hive of activity: bilges are being emptied as part of the hourly schedule, Alex is in super cleaning mode, the creative dept. are planning a Greenings welcome... oh and there's just been a shout of “whale”, not much use to me since I'm down below with no lifejacket on!

All down under,

Andy Greenough