New bottlescrews please

We have been at sea for just over a week on this leg. The new crew members have settled in very well; Ben Pate has joined us for the rest of the race and Alysoun Sturt-Scobie, Ross Ham, Keith Evans and Patrick Hays are on board for this leg to make up minimum numbers on the boat. All of them are experienced sailors, bringing lots of good ideas and tips on how to make Mission Performance go faster. With expectations high for a good race up to Qingdao we were ready to show everyone what we could do!!! Then a call came through from the race office to say that for safety reasons this part of the race was to be stopped as three of the other boats had had rigging problems and the bottlescrew had broken on the outer forestay, which under tension helps keep the mast fixed in the upright position. Here I have a picture of it in Singapore to show where the problem is.    (I must have known, haha!)

Outer forestay

So for the last three days we have been motor sailing with the rest of the fleet towards Hong Kong to make a quick stop there in a couple of days and have the offending part replaced. Then restart the race up to Qingdao, which will now be run as an elapsed time race, with each boat resuming as soon as they are ready to do so. 

With the pressure of racing off at the moment we have had some fun today as it is Alysouns Birthday, we had a pub quiz, at which point I got hit in the face by a flying fish; everyone thought that was hilarious, except me! 

Finally all on Mission Performance send there best wishes to Laura Frudd who is a Sea Cadet from Yorkshire and should have been joining the team in Qingdao,   unfortunately glandular fever has put a stop to this. Laura we are thinking of you! 

Singapore Slings

On Thursday the 13th we arrived at lunchtime into Singapore and berthed at the One 15 Marina at Sentosa Cove. All the usual faces were there to meet us with drinks. We then cleared immigration which was set up on the quayside and went back to work deep cleaning through the boat. 

We set up a rota which allowed all of the team a few days off to chill out and see Singapore, so first of all I went with my Dad for a Singapore Sling in Raffles Hotel, followed by a trip up to the top of 'Sky Park' for some great views of the city. In the evening we went to a Chinese New Year show to celebrate the year of the Horse. The next day I went to a real Chinese laundry to do all my washing and Sir Robin Knox-Johnston came help fix a problem with our rudder bearings on Mission Performance. In the evening there was the prize giving ceremony for the winning teams (ours is still to come!!!) and a crew meal. 

The day after we had a visit to the boat from 50 Sea Scouts who had a good look round before we organised some games on Mission Performance with them. On the last day we restocked the boat with provisions and met 5 new crew members who have joined us for the next leg as we are short on numbers due to some minor injuries and personal reasons of some of the crew from the previous leg who had to get off (however let me stress we are a happy crew with a great skipper and sponsor, It's just very demanding conditions at sea that we have to go through). So we are ready to set sail for Qingdao and get some much needed points for the team.

Immigration

Raffles Hotel

Sky Park

A real Chinese laundry

Sir Robin Knox-Johnston & Me

Coconut Watch

We have now spent over a month at sea, so no surprise we are excited to be getting into Singapore sometime tomorrow. For the past week we have been motor sailing due to the light winds and we have taken advantage of the free time to do numerous maintenance jobs and cleaning around the boat. As you can imagine after nearly 5 weeks of hot and stuffy conditions, things below deck start becoming rather unpleasant! It has also allowed me to get some sail repair jobs done, repairing the mainsail (involving a trip up the mast) and checking our Yankees as on the next section of the race they are going to receive a right battering!

The important watches still continue however; Pirate watch- little activity recently although quite a few small fishing boats have approached us trying to sell fish but nothing suspicious. Coconut watch- this is proving unsuccessful as no one can quite reach them with the net as they bob by, lost out at sea. Log watch- we have had a few small collisions with debris but no damage, and traffic watch- well, there are lots of cargo ships around so at night time it's a guessing game as to which way they will go next.

Because of all the motoring we have been doing it was necessary to make a pit stop for fuel, so we called into Malaysia (only for a few hours) and topped up. It also gave us the opportunity to catch up with some of the fleet and we even got to raft up along side Team Garmin for a few hours and exchange stories of the past weeks, and also re-stock up on oil, hot chocolate and spread (items we had run out of) however, I feel they fell short in the bargain as they only received 8 sachets of Tang (a orange drink powder) and half a fruit pudding with custard! But no one complained!

So now this section of the race is over, it's time to prepare for the next. Even though we finished last, we are all pleased we only finished 2 hours behind the 11th place after setting 20 hours late, it was important early on in this race to change our goals and have something we could aim for and it has been good to see how a small group of very different people have changed over the past 5 weeks. It has been a mixture of highs and lows and I know that people have found it really tough, but I feel that the real test will be the next race from the heat of Singapore to the freezing conditions of Qingdao, we will all have to learn how to adapt and cope.

Still playing catch up.

Life on board these last few days has been good although very hot, we have found some strong winds to fly our kites, gaining ground on the rest of the fleet and we are all really pleased we've been able to catch up even though we set off 20 hours late, these next 24 hours are going to be the final push to see if we can gain a few more miles before the end of race 8a. We can then turn our engine on to cross the Sulu Sea along with the rest of the fleet.

Unfortunately, flying kites on Mission Performance doesn't always go smoothly as a few days ago Bruce was flying quite happily until his clew ripped off, So I spent the next few days fixing him by hand (as our sewing machine is broken) and telling the new guys that they had better get some practice stitching as I don't think this will be the last time, however, today we finally hoisted him and so far so good!

Just over a week ago we crossed the Equator, it was decided by Kate, Claire and Matt that I should be Queen Neptuna... well I got to wear a gown and a crown! and also chuck flour and a mixture of bean stew, coffee and pancake mix over the pollywogs! Matt took advantage and threw most of the mixture on them, I'd say they got away with it lightly as the supply of flying fish on deck has been completely...err,  nothing, so no 'kiss the fish' then!

The start of next race from Singapore to Qingdao I gather has been put back a few days and I've heard it is going to be the one of the toughest; slamming upwind for 20 days moving into freezing temperatures. Just hoping it will go smoothly and nothing bad will happen!