Leg 5 Race 1.. A fine system, country tunes and fishing..

02 February 2024

I have introduced a fine system into our watch. Based off of our university hockey team’s model, I am hoping that this will be a fun way to improve safety on board as well as keeping everyone on their toes and pushing hard. Fines will be accumulated through the race and given out at the end in Ha Long Bay in liquid form (alcoholic, preferably). For example, forgetting to do up your life jacket: instant 4 sips, triple clipping on: finish your drink. I’m hoping we can have a nice debrief at the end and finish off with these fines. If it doesn’t work or anyone disagrees, or worries too much about the fines and not the actual safety, it’ll go away. Just another little layer to liven up the watch and have a joke. There are some silly ones thrown into the mix...

We started our engine to go through our motoring section of the Doldrums at 8 degrees south, giving us our full permitted 4 degrees under motor to take us to the exit gate of the corridor; this 4 degrees also has to take at least 36 hours, if we end up 4 degrees further along with time to spare we would be forced to wait before beginning racing again. Initially we had a slight plan to sail the whole way through this section, removing the restrictions and allowing us to pass through the other side without stopping. This is something that hasn’t been done before, since the corridor rules had been introduced, and would’ve been a pretty cool accomplishment. The wind was there as well, a pretty consistent 8knots, however, it was coming from directly ahead of us, heading south; this would’ve meant that the straight line distance to the gate of 240 miles would increase to just over 400, the trade off and risk would’ve been too great, maybe next time... Once under motor we pootled along in the company of Punta, DC, UNICEF, and Dare to Lead, all also under motor. Because of this the positions didn’t alter that much through this time; if everyone had timed their motor declarations correctly they should be aiming for the same speed to avoid waiting at the other end, thus preventing any possibility of motor racing.

In our watch we went into an easy alphabetical rotor on the helm, half an hour each to take us through the long, tedious nights of motor sailing. Holding to a course under motor isn’t especially difficult, and the lack of deck work meant that people were fine to go below and have a well needed rest in the meantime. Our first evening motoring we came to a calm deck and played country tunes to liven the night. We went through different crew members top five songs and I tried to find some of them amongst my collection, mostly in vain, I think I may have been born too late for some of them.

The day brought new activities not usually available on our yacht. The lack of racing meant it was fine to cast a line out! I assembled my new telescopic rod, sneakily packed nicely in my bag, and began to attempt to traul. Half an hour earlier we had seen a bunch of decent sized fish leaping out of the water, either chasing or being chased by something, and so my hopes were high. This excitement also caused a lapse in sensibility as I positioned myself firmly at the back of the boat in my life jacket, shorts, and an old layer of sunscreen. Two hours went by without fish, one lost lure (and a fair bit of line), and a brilliant cherry tan line to match a few of my other crewmates suffering from ill judgement; plenty enjoyable at the time though as it offered a mental break from the sailing, casting out at sunset was gorgeous. Santa managed to ask us nicely enough to drop the main so we could attempt to stop it being so floppy when upwind, we have been slower than other boats at certain time and the fact that our leach was falling away from the sail to leeward a lot of the time may have been the issue. We removed the battens and readjusted them and their tension in the sail to try to solve the problem.

We slowly pulled closer to the line, our timing had been perfect. As we reached it we quickly turned the engine off and our bow onto course. There was a wind hole to the west of us so we decided on a north easterly route around it, the other yachts in our company were of the same mindset and racing recommenced. Leaving the Doldrums behind us, and the Marinara Trench to the West (deepest water on the planet at just over 10km), we pushed on into the night, and head on into more squalls. Our radar was showing angry red ghosts inching closer and closer to us, so we began on preparing for the worst.

We reefed, then dropped the Yankee just as we began to see 20knots of wind, so smoothly, straight to the deck without hassle, and braced. It never came... not as we’d expected it. What did come was lots, and lots, of rain. Very wet, skin saturating, sky blanketing, darkness inducing, pre-pubescent squalls with little-ish wind plagued us through the night. This was the first time we had been cold this leg, the wet had sapped any warmth from our skin and the air, forcing a very reluctant reach into the wet locker for my red lightweight Qingdao jacket, a move I had hoped I wouldn’t have had to use before Zhuhai. Still, we sailed faster than the others. We’re getting good at that. The plan now is to keep our course north into fairer winds.

Will x