James Kelly update

So it appears we are finally in the trade winds and we are moving at a
steady 9-10 knots but we are been hunted down by Nomad which is a 56ft Cat
which are seven feet longer than us and would have more sail area hence more
speed so they will have to give us time on the handicap but that wont do,
so we pushing as hard as we can.

2 days ago diasaster struck and our worst fears were realised. Another one
of those bad days i guess. We were all having G&T’s on the foredeck a
little tradition we have now that every arvie we hike up to the foredeck
and take a moment to just realise where we are and how magnificent this
planet is. We have not seen another boat or even a remanant that another
human being exists which is rare nowdays, not even a piece of rubbish
only ocean, horizon and wildlife. A real wilderness it feels like.

So we finished up our G&T’s and had some dinner, a chicken and ham
pie, quite ridiculous! Scott went onto the helm and we were flying our
secret weapon the 130 square metre symmetrical spinnaker. For those of you that
saw the start its the white one with EDC printed on it that we used after
rounding the
first mark in front of Granger bay.

Its super light cloth of .75 ounces and we were cruising in about 15 knots of
breeze. This was to be the workhorse sail that would pull us through the
moderate winds
of the trades all the way to rio. Next we heard the words which i dread to hear
“ALL HANDS ON DECK!!!!”. We all scrambled up to see that the sail had been
completlely
ripped apart. It had fell back as the boat slumped into a trough of a wave and
hooked the luff behind the spreader and then powered back up again as the
momentem of
the boat came off the swell and ripped it from top to bottom all alongside the
portside seam. We were Gutted, but now were sitting with a fishing tangle on a
grand
scale. 130sqm of sail ripped and twisted everywhich way all the accompanying
sheets, halyards, guy ropes and hoisting ropes, the sock in which the spinnaker
is
hoisted from and down into, strewn into a conundrum of crap. I would sooner take
on a rubix cube before attempting this. The resulting mess had wrapped
itself
around the portside stay and Chris quickly got into the bosmans chair and we
hoisted him up the stay to salavage what we could while the rest of us wrestled
to keep
the sail from going under the boat and wrapping the vessel in it. Ofcourse it
was dark to add injury to insult and we battled for thirty minutes to try to
untangle,
pull through and twist whatever we could to free the leftovers. Eventually we
cut away one of the ropes and we were left with a huge pile! A metaphor for how
we felt
perhaps.

There was silence as it felt as we had blown our chances of completing this race
in good time, this is the one thing we had talked about that we could not let
happen,
just happened. I went to bed and nobody talked of it again.

The next morning we felt deflated but at breakfast we read aloud the mails that
doug had sent from the blog. They gave us such a push to get up and continue and
we
decided to put it behind us and keep on trucking so thanks to everyone you has
taken the time to send us well wishes and general banter it’s such a great
feeling.

Two sails two weeks.  Sailing is expensive at this rate and thank god we have
insurance and disputed the cover of sails before leaving for this trip. Good
prep pays
it seams!

We also crossed the Greenwich meridan and King Neptune decided to pay us a visit
aka Dave. The bare chested God donned a tinfoil crown, toothpaste painted face,
judron rugby shorts and a trident made from an oar. When he walked out i thought
i had missed the memo and it was tranny night on the foredeck. Being the rookie
that
i am and a first timer to cross the meridian i was doused with onion baji
mixture to commemorate my crossing. I only later found out that you only do this
when you
cross the equator and not the meridan and they all had a good laugh at my
expense, it was still worth seeing Dave dressed like a Tranny though but I’m
still picking
onion baji out my hair, it unbeleivelably sticky.

We made good time yesterday Day 7 and clocked 175 nautical miles up and still
managed to get a futher degree north which is one in the bank as we will need
this later
due to the winds further north being more reliable as they are further away from
the south atlantic highs generally of higher velocity. We are approximately on
the same latitude to Rio and
we are left with the 2000NM straight to the finish line. Its a huge game of
chess across an
entire ocean with unpredictable variables thrown into the mix and it makes
everyday
exciting as the next as we await our poistion reports to come at 14:30 everyday.
Lets hope they are wat we looking for!

Chat again soon!

Cheers,

James and crew