Race 2 - Day 6
Crew Diary - Race 2 Day 6
21 September

Hello everyone, especially friends and family!

Can’t believe its almost been a week since we left Portimão, we have travelled 1308 NM and are currently travelling at 7.6nm with, and this is more important figure, VMG of 7.2. We are all pretty excited to be in first place at the moment and there is much rushing up and down the sleeping corridors to recheck the position and discussions about the position of the other boats with their AIS switched off.

Life aboard now feels completely normal, I am always surprised by how sleepy I feel, but maybe, as we are constantly moving even when sleeping, we are working harder than we think.

Ripping our Code 3 was disappointing but a small team has risen to the challenge, lead by our noble leader - Barry, we have each spent in excess of 12 hours on an off, reconstructing, hand sewing, sticking patches and now machine sewing the top to bottom (including head and clew sections) tear. The whole operation happened in the sail locker in sauna-like conditions. The main hatch is now open and I can hear the sewing machine running as I write this.

Another drama has starting happening on night watches and that is several flying fish have ended up on the deck. They seem to have the ability to find crew members and even the skipper before landing with a thud on the deck. They attack in any direction, hitting Skip on the back whilst he was standing at the stern. Others have been hit on the shoulder and leg. Always smelly, always unpleasant and then comical when someone tries to get it back over the side.

Running out of everyone’s favourite food on board is an ongoing nightmare of mine and I am having to ration Pringles and kitchen roll. I’m thinking of introducing Pringle Sundays and Hob Knobs Wednesdays. Other things are doing well – we have plenty of chilli sauce and loo rolls, luckily!

Thanks for taking the time to read this and for following our race.

From somewhere mid-atlantic.

Su