Ello folks, how's it going? Now way back when, when the race route got released, I scanned all the legs looking at where they went: Cape Town, brilliant, Australia, great, Philippines, been there before but cool, and New York was on my bucket list, and then I saw this race… ah. Around the top of Scotland and down the North Sea with a quick jaunt up the Thames - think I’d go back to the Roaring Forties compared with the tidal streams, gas fields, oil fields, commercial shipping, commercial fishing, traffic separation schemes, submarine exercise areas, wind farms, fish farms, old ammunition dumps, sandbanks…oh and ten other Clipper Race boats. The beautiful ocean swells are well and truly behind us now, and now we get the luxury of beating into wind over tide, with that wonderful unmistakable sound of us slamming through waves, quickly followed by the groans of the crew like when your in your mid 50s and you have to bend over to pick up your post off the floor.
Right, well now that's all been covered, I once taught a bloke to sail called Nick (nice fella) and I’ll always remember a conversation we had… I asked him where his favourite place in the world was, knowing that he had lived in all the big fancy cities and he said: "it would be the Shetland Isles, because for two days a year it's the most stunning place in the world!" Well Nick I'm not sure today is our day but hey there's always tomorrow.
Song of the day Paolo Nutini, Caledonia (song means a lot to me)
Josh, Maisie and the crew of Ha Long Bay, Viet Nam