Race 2 - Day 26
Skipper Report
11 October

Hello again and hopefully for the last time this leg, not that I don’t thoroughly enjoy writing these blogs.

Today seemed to be a constant battle with light winds and Qingdao having a seeming magic wind machine follow them this afternoon. As the sun rose yesterday morning, we had had a good night under the Code 2 Spinnaker and made so great miles towards the finish. Then as forecast, the wind slowly but surely eased and eased and eased. Then came the time for us to test out almost all our sails. If anything, it kept the crew busy and stopped them thinking about then end of the race. Within 2/3 hours we went from Code 2 to Yankee 1 and Staysail, then to Windseeker then moving onto Code 1, all the while being baffled by Qingdao’s seemingly out of this world speed (only 7 knots, but when we were doing 3 it looks really fast).

So, the weather for tomorrow as Simon Rowell our weather forecaster (Clipper Race Meteorologist) says is a ‘HOOB’ day (Head out of boat). The two GRIB files he sent us yesterday, one being a larger scale than the other both seem to have completely contradicting ideas on what the wind will do tomorrow. But, no matter what the forecast says, it is only a forecast, and we can only sail in the wind that we have, so HOOB day it is and lets hope we get into Punta del Este for a nice cold beer before it gets dark.

Log of the day: ‘ Finally the wind has picked up’.

Until Leg 2,

Seumas