Race 2 - Day 28
Skipper Report
13 October

Ian Wiggin
Ian Wiggin
Team Unicef
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Good morning,

There is not enough data allowance for me to explain yesterday's events fully in this blog. What a day.

Condensation is dripping from every surface onto the keyboard as I type, and huge lightning bolt zig-zags are burned into my retinas from last night.

So, to cut a long-long-long story short, the main events of yesterday were:

Squalls galore!! Clouds that look like they descended from MOUNT DOOM arrived in the afternoon. At first they looked like any normal thundery rain clouds. But, these clouds suddenly reared up like monsters above us. The clouds turned night to day and laughed at our feeble attempts to outrun them. The low, thick cloud was beautiful and the lightning has been breathtaking - if not a bit scary at times. I hope we do not lose power while I am typing this. As one squall approached, we had managed to drop the largest of our head sails before the wind came. The gusts topped out at 86 knots which was unexpected. Imagine sticking your head out of the window in the fast lane on the motorway - it is really quite breezy. Sadly, we did not have chance to get a reef in the Mainsail before the sudden onset of the squall. As you can imagine, it was quite a lively ride. It was made even more lively when the rope that controls the Mainsail was taken off the winch and completely let go. At that point all we were able to do was turn downwind and go really fast to try and take some of the force off the sail. Of course there was time to get some super cool videos of the weather phenomena, and phenomenal helming of Mike who kept us all safe.

Another key event of yesterday was surfing down wind through lighter squalls with the spinnaker up. With bucket fulls of rain, huge thunder claps, and lightning all around. The wind would change direction, so at times we would be aiming towards the finish, whilst at others we would be aiming north. The sleigh ride came to an end when the wind died completely and the super wet sail hung limply.

Now, I like to wind people up and have a bit of fun from time to time. One of my guilty pleasures is telling people that certain varieties of black and white seabirds are penguins, whilst trying to keep a straight face. Well, today we actually saw a rockhopper penguin. There we were, becalmed 50nm from land, with a soggy spinnaker hanging limply on the bow, whilst a small lonesome penguin swam alongside us. Very surreal. I had feared that the land flies, insects and small bird invasion from yesterday was here to stay. But, after the wind today, I am happy to let you know that I think they are all now very far away from here.

Here we go,

Ian and Mike