It was a spectacular
sight leaving San Francisco underneath The Golden Gate Bridge, with helicopters and
spectator boats surrounding us we tacked all the way out of the Bay, then turned left, hoisted our
kite and it has been none stop
kite flying ever since. Gradually the weather has been warming up, a huge contrast to the past few races, shorts
and t-shirts are beginning to make appearances again. All this kite flying means we have been making great
speeds towards Panama, but I suspect
that in a few days time we will be slowing down as we head into those familiar grounds of the Doldrums.
Sadly, my fellow Round
the World crew member, Claire, has been unable to take part in this race from San Francisco to
Panama due to a hip injury. This means we have needed a new 'mast monkey' and somehow I was nominated
for the post by Matt and the other day I found myself for over an hour clinging
on for dear life at the very top of the mast in a rolling sea state trying to swap the Spinnaker halyards (the
line that attaches the head of the
kite to the mast) as we had chafed through our working one, It was incredibly hard, although
Claire has done this many times, in
far rougher sea states and stronger winds! I guess this will not be the last time I have to go up there before the end
of this race but I feel a bit more
confident in going up next time as I know where the best gripping on points
are, of which there are few!
For
now, we have been spending some of our time teaching the new joining crew how
the boat runs smoothly, we have an enlarged crew
totaling 16 and I had forgotten what it was like to have this amount of people on board, as it means that we
don't have to wake up the other watch
members for sail changes and generally life has been a bit easier! I can't imagine what it will be like on leg 8
when we will have even more people
on board!
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