Archives by: Jessica Ford
Monday 2nd to Tuesday 3rd January 2017
Monday 2nd to Tuesday 3rd January 2017
We heard that one of the yachts in the 2nd start, Black Pearl, shot out of Cape Town like a champagne cork, doing over 20 knots. Considering we were only doing an average of 6-7 knots we would be needing to look over our shoulders quite soon. In a following swell we were sometimes momentarily achieving up to 14 knots of speed as the boat surfed down the waves. Every time the boat accelerated down ...
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Saturday 31st to Sunday 01st January 2017
Saturday 31st to Sunday 01st January 2017
After a day of no clouds at all, dark clouds formed on the horizon all around us as the day’s evaporation of the ocean condensed in the cool evening air. As we were pulling in one of the bungee lines at sunset an Oceanic tuna grabbed the lure and found itself turned into sushi very shortly afterwards. The flesh was a very dark red and more gamey than the Bigeye tuna we had eaten previously.
Max ...
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Thursday 29th to Friday 30th December 2016
Thursday 29th to Friday 30th December 2016
From the early morning we had good sailing with the heavier white spinnaker under reasonably controllable conditions and then we had a couple of near broaches that we saved by “smoking the guy”, i.e. releasing the line to the spinnaker clew that passes through the beak of the pole to de-power the spinnaker. The only problem was that the second time we did this the guy was released entirely, resulting in the spinnaker wrapping around ...
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Tuesday 27th to Wednesday 28th December 2016
Tuesday 27th to Wednesday 28th December 2016
In the late afternoon we spotted a big Yellowtail following very closely behind the boat and then a couple of minutes later both bungee lines with skirt lures were taken by a Yellowtail, one quite a bit bigger than the other. Pulling in the smaller one by hand it dropped off the lure as we tried to get it on board so we gaffed the big one to ensure that we had it for supper, ...
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Monday 26th December 2016
Monday 26th December 2016
After several months of frenetic activity preparing the boat for the race and discussing what to expect among the crew we all finally gathered mid-morning on the start day at the RCYC to participate in the blessing of the fleet and clear customs and immigration for our trip. Our perishable provisions were brought on board, sponsor decals applied to the hull with the help of family and friends and we slipped our mooring at 13:00 Bravo to the ...
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