as the days pass

I've been wanted to blog for a few days to update on our boats positions but have been pretty tied up with other matters. I'm not exactly that busy but just never got round to blog.

We haven't really been doing very well ... we've been hovering around 7th-10th positions. The boats are expected to arrive Portugal today... But based on the positions we might come in say 12-20 hours behind the leader... Durban.

As days passed, I am actually getting jittery as I read about the team onboard US. Most seem to be suffering from seasickness. I'm probably one of those who will suffer big time ....argh...

Here's what our skipper wrote in our diary on day 4...


Dear Diary,

Today is Wednesday (or as we like to think of it aboard Uniquely Singapore day 4).The dawn broke with a lovely colour scheme this morning but most were too busy too notice as we were occupied with a change down from #2 yankee as the wind built in intensity for 15 minutes. As quickly as the gust had arrived it departed and we were back up to our #2 with staysail and double reefed main.

Since the start we have carried out something like 15 sail changes. Some of those with as few as 3 people as the majority of crew were disabled by seasickness for 36 hours. The weather abated yesterday and we had a lovely days sail averaging 3 to 7 kts whilst many boats around us fell into wind holes.

That allowed us to move from 10th to 7th place over a 12 hr period but alas a brief lapse in concentration overnight has seen us slip back to either 9th or 10th. However, as we like to say on Singapore "the race isn't over until the umpa loompas dock"!

Morale improved markedly once the majority of the crew stopped throwing up. Yesterday was like watching a feeding frenzy at the zoo as we all tried to replace the lost calories from the previous 36 hrs.

To date we have been fortunate with no injuries or breakages and hope that this will continue. Earlier problems with the generator have been resolved after a sterling effort by our two engineers over a 3hour period yesterday.

Fingers crossed for some better luck today as we see whether our gamble to place ourselves well west of the rest of the fleet pays off.

Cheers,

Richard Falk - Skipper
Uniquely Singapore
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