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Race Start |
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 After waving goodbye, the team had to prepare the boat |
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 Alex asked Paula if she really knew what all these ropes were for! |
Phil was prepped up in the harness ready to go up the spinnaker pole |
 Another quick briefing session |
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 We noticed our fresh water pump wasn't working, so radioed challenge who brought one out before the race start. This picture, modified to remove the Sydney skyline, was used as our "fresh pants at Waypoint Bravo" story that they refused to publish (in case someone didn't realise it was a joke!). |
 The Stelmar supporter's boat |
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 Newton had his own supporter's boat! |
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 The 18ft Skiffs were out having a race on the same day. In this and the next picture is the boat of a mate back in London who'd brought his out here... |
 Lots of spectator craft |
The start box was very tight |
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A few choppers which were VERY loud! |
 The gun went and we were off!!! |
 As ever, first over the line and the rest of the fleet were behind us! |
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 All tightly packed. |
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 This is "normal" for a Challenge yacht! |
 Ah... still behind us! |
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 Clive was rather happy about ANOTHER 1st over the line (stake your money on it for the next legs - seems to be a sure thing on Stelmar!) and congratulated us all :) |
By the way, this is classed as gentle and calm! |
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 That's me sitting on the rail. Don't really know why I wasn't helping the others - suppose I was told to sit there! :) |
Past the heads and off we went South... very very South! The supporters boats peeled off at this point and apart from the helicopters we were on our own... 6,500 miles of rough stuff to go. |
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 This shot really shows how large the boat is - look at the helm. |
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 Soon, the fleet split and we didn't even see them. With a watch system of half and half, 8 people on a (relatively) small boat was pretty much all the human contact we had from this point for 6 weeks. |
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Paul, Kate, Rob and Julian. All looking fresh, clean and shaven. Wouldn't be long before it all changed!! |
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 The first day was HOT, very very HOT! Which was nice :) |
 Scaling the pole to drop the spinnaker. |
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TRIM.... |
TRIM... |
 TRIM... Perfect! ;) |
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 Darkness fell for the first time and we experienced the first of 38 nights! |
 Flying the spinnaker at night - no difference from the day.. you just have to work out a way to see what you're doing!! |
 Can you trim in this? :) |
 The Navigation station |
 This is James, but it's a typical look from one being woken up to get ready to go on watch. |
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Spinnakers... Also known as kites. This is what one looks like when flying properly. It's attached to a pole at one end and has a person on the other - "flying" it at all times. These next few pictures explains a bit more about these powerful sails. |
 Firstly, they can only be used downwind, secondly - only when the wind isn't too strong, and thirdly they are fragile. Put a small nick in one as it's being moved around or hoisted and once flying the pressure will find that tear and rip it! |
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To bring it down, one sends a man in a harness to climb to the top of the pole. When all in place, he 'spikes' (a metal spike - used to force open the shackle) the clew (corner) and it flies free. |
 At that point, the rest of the crew pull it through the "letterbox" - ensuring it doesn't re-fill and do it's own thing. |
As it's pulled through the letterbox, it's stuffed down below where someone else pulls it in. |
 It sort of looks like this! |
 It's a mess when it first comes down so step1 is to untwist it. |
The head (top) is dragged to the front of the boat and secured to a rope in the forepeak. |
Each of the two clews are then
dragged to the port and starboard sides of the boat. (no pic!) The legs are bunched together and tied in wool (again no pic!). |
 In this picture Sue is skilfully holding her arms at the specified 92.5 cm apart where Julian will then cut when ready into lots of pieces of wool. |
 The rest of the sail is then bunched up and zipped up, with the tapes (sides) at the top, in a 'sock'. This sock allows the opening point of the kite to be more controlled. ie. One doesn't always want it to fill immediately. |
 Once complete it's backed into the bag (in a certain way so it comes out the same way!) and... |
 ...30 minutes to an hour later you have one packed spinnaker! |
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Sue points to some water |
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 Starting from the left... DSC emergency aerial Dunno (little one) Iridium (email & satellite phone) GPS SatC Spare VHF radio (main one is on mast) SSB long range , bounce off ionosphere, radio And the circular thing is the radar |
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 This is a nick (click to enlarge) that you have to look out for all the time. This kite was taken down quick enough to prevent it being a major problem. |
 This is also a Nick(o) that you have to look out for all the time (ho-ho-ho, I'm so funny!) :) |
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I didn't realise when I took this, that it was the last bit of land (Tasmania) we would see for over a month! |
Next page... going into worse weather!
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