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

There's no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothing.

As I am writing, the Mighty PSP Logistics is chunking along at 11-12 knots with a nice breeze from south east slightly forward of the beam. The breeze comes straight out of the blistering Antarctica and the windchill makes the environment bone-chillingly cold. Despite this I am perfectly fine and as warm as can be, all thanks to my proper clothing. In the cold and clear nights down here in the Southern Ocean when there are no evolutions going on to keep us warm, we have established a routine where every crew goes below for a half an hour each during the four hour long night watch to warm up. I haven't felt that need simply because of my good clothes which I eventually dug out of the bottom of my cubby hole.

I did a lot of research on this before I set off. The biggest question I had before going shopping was synthetic, semi synthetic or all natural? The development in clothing technology has come far but I still landed on good old natural, more specifically wool and merino wool. I haven't regretted it once. The features of wool are great, it keeps you warm even being wet and drys out quickly.

There`s a small factory in Langevaagen, a small village outside Aalesund my origin hometown on the north western coast of Norway, which has produced high quality wool for generations. They have equipped my Norwegian ancestors amongst successful polar explorers like Fritjof Nansen and Roald Amundsen. I wear Devold`s socks, single and double layer baselayers with a balaclava, a buff and best of all the characteristic white and black Islandic sweater. My fleecy bum-padded shorts turned out to be an essential. And on top of that maybe the very best kit I own - my Henri Lloyd dry suit; magnificent.