Trudy Willows Sailing

New year; New season

2009-01-29T14:34:16Z

January is over already and my head is full of this years racing and barely an evenings sleep hasn't involved a dream of being out on the boat. I guess I've really got the bug

Yesterday I filled my diary will all the JOG race dates and of course with the RORC Fastnet, I'm especially looking forward to all that has to throw at me.

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Home at last

2008-07-12T22:19:03Z

nuff said :o)

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ahhh, good old Blighty

2008-07-09T21:48:19Z

Well I've certainly been there and done that and have a few t-shirts to prove it, however I'm still not home safe and sound but lounging around lovely wet Dartmouth.

The race is over but the boats need to get home to Gosport and they can't sail themselves so a skeleton crew are sailing them back down and I can honestly say this is the hardest bit of sailing I've had to do. Even motor-sailing the 3,000 miles from Hawaii to Santa Cruz comes 2nd to this. It isn't that the seas are rough or that the weather is awful, though it has been very wet, it is the absolute opposite and this is making the trip so darned dull; just sitting around on deck for 4 hours hoping and praying that the wind will get up so we can raise a sail and turn the engine off and get some real work done.

I'm not complaining, I'm getting 2 days in Dartmouth and have even splurged out the last little bit of money I've got on yet another hotel room and boy is this one worth every penny, so for having to endure a week of bringing the boats home I am grateful for this stop-off and the most comfortable bed I think I have ever slept in.

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Last race

2008-07-03T07:16:21Z

Hurrah!!

Only 2 racing days left taking us from Ireland to Liverpool. It's hard to know how to mentally prepare for this one; one the one hand it is crossing the Irish sea which is renown to be lump, bumpy and cold but our weather forecast says light winds and this suggests a smooth crossing. Who knows? I'll be updating soon enough though.

Trudle-pip xx

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It wasn't so bad

2008-06-29T19:13:18Z

What was I whittering on about back in Sydney? Crossing the Atlantic was a doddle, even if we did come in at 9th position so will miss our target position of being in top 5 of the overall race leaderboard.

We had a right mixture of weather, starting with cold and being on iceberg watch, to dense fog and on iceberg and any other shipping watch to sunshine and showers, topped off with 40knots of wind blasting us along.

The down side of this race is that someone brought a bug onboard and it ripped its way through our watch, a chest infection on a racing yacht mid-ocean is no fun but there is a plus side that you get sent to your bunk for as long as it takes to get over the worst of it and this means sleep. Lots and lots of, reasonably, uninterrupted sleep. Now that is a rarety and a luxury not to be, ahem, sneezed at.

So then here I am in Ireland sat in a comfortable hotel room enjoying the sensation of a steady platform beneath my feet. Admittedly my head is swaying just a little bit but I put this down to it being 8pm and we hit land at 5am, the showers by 5.15 and the bar at 5.30am. No, don't tut, I haven't been drinking all day, and yes mum I have eaten, I'm just shattered and have been down to meet a friend who came in 2nd on this race so toasted her success with a glass of champaign. What I should be doing now is heading down to the yacht club to catch up with my crewmies and fellow sailors but that bed is looking oh so comfortable.

Maybe I'll just have a quick snooze. . . .

footnote; I'm too tired to read this back and correct grammar/spelling but I'm sure you'll forgive me this one time

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The final push

2008-06-16T11:28:34Z

There's no beating about the bush, I am dreading this next race. There, I've said it out loud. Some or most of my closest friends know that prior to joining the race I couldn't bring myself to contemplate the Atlantic crossing and I was somehow miraculously going to get from Canada to Cork. I've got one hour before I have to join the boat and I am still unable to think about it. If I could get off now I would without hesitation or a look backward at the fleet.

Our tactitians told us last night that there are 2 options for our route;

1) head north then east - this is approx 200 miles shorter distance than opt 2, however we will have wind, waves and tide against us so it will be a hard 3-4 day slog and far from comfortable sailing.

2) head east then north - should be a much quicker race start but will still have to head north at some point and at this stage we don't have the weather to know if we'll still have a hard slog of it at the end.

I am just hoping and praying we go with option 2. When I joined the race in Hawaii we had just the awful conditions we could be about to face again and that was no laughing matter. I was scared out of my boots for the first week of that sail and I don't want to feel that fear again thank-you very much.

This morning I have been trying to tell myself over and over that I wanted to challenge myself, to feel a sense of achievement and to accomplish something big in the name of Matthew and so onboard I must go. Wish me luck.

T xx

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Too much to say

2008-05-24T14:08:33Z

At last I'm in a port with internet access and at last I manage to get onto one of the only 2 pc's available to us (probably because I should already be on the boat doing last minute preparations with the rest of the crew).

I brief update:

I left Hawaii and 3 weeks later landed in Santa Cruz, looking forward to a relaxing few days and to get washing done, alas Clipper had other ideas and we had 24 hours in port. Still, can't complain that's enough time to sample more than sufficient quantities of B&C.

From SC we raced to Panama but man-o-man what a slow race that was, our boat took a different tactic to the rest of the fleet [it is becoming apparent to me that they always take a different tactic] and it didn't pay off because we spent more time becalmed and trying to find wind than actually moving. Still, not to complain, we made it to Panama just a day behind the majority of the fleet and ahead of the last boat.

Panama to Jamaica, now that was a quick fast race, unless you're sailing on WA in which case you take a different tactic to the rest of the fleet and find yourselves becalmed. Not to worry, we made up time and came in within 5 minutes of 9th place boat.

Next comes New York, I believe this should be a short fast race. . . . .

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We're off. Maybe

2008-04-09T17:52:01Z

today could be the day we set sail, or maybe tomorrow. Our repaired mast was put in place yesterday afternoon, we also finished stitching the mainsail so that's all good to go. Today we have to attach the boom to the mast and the riggers have to tension the mast and that should be us ready to go.

I've just moved onboard and bagsied a bunk for myself, apparently it's a good one, but if it's universally considered good then why is it free? Methinks my new crewmies may be pulling a horrid trick on me.

I've still not got an onboard media account so it may be a while before I manage to update my blog or send emails. I will try and be the person to do the first few boat blogs on www.clipperventures.com (westernaustralia2011c.com is my boat incase I hadn't drilled that into you before I left) just to let you know how I'm getting on.

Clipper are telling us they expect we'll arrive in Santa Cruz about the 22nd of April.

Trudle-pip xx

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All booked

2008-04-04T20:04:32Z

That's me all booked up to fly to Hawaii this Sunday to join the boat there and sail her whenever she's seaworthy again and to wherever her destination is set. If the mast is fixed in time for WA and Durban to sail by Wednesday then we'll be heading to Santa Cruz as per the race plan and will be in a 2 boat match race to get there. If they're not ready to sail by Wednesday then they won't make it to California in time to catch up with the rest of the fleet in time to start race 9, so we'll be heading direct to Panama instead.

The sail to Santa Cruz is around 14 days and will be a 2-3 day pit-stop for us. The sail to Panama is a very different thing, is approx twice the distance so we will be looking at 20 days at sea, the plus side of this is we'll get a decent stopover in Panama waiting for the rest of the boats to make it there from California.

I guess I should go cook us a dinner, the last one I'll be doing here for a long time.

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Stressing? Me?

2008-04-03T16:32:32Z

I'm not feeling quite as stressed this afternoon as I was this morning.

I've spoken to the Clipper office and asked for confirmation of what day exactly I need to be in Hawaii by and are they sure it has to be by Monday. I figured last night that it wouldn't hurt to send a text to a friend who is already doing the race and 'stranded' in Honolulu waiting for race 8 to start and see from her what the word is on the ground regarding the state of play and timescales. Unofficialy the maintenance crew opinion is that the boat will be seaworthy again and ready to set sail on Wednesday which means I've got a couple more days at home to orgainise myself properly. Unfortunately Clipper office are not, yet, giving out this info.

More encouraging news, I got notice from the courrier this afternoon that my passport will be delivered tomorrow morning. Hurrah!

Even more good news; my PLB (emergency beacon in the eventuality I become accidentaly separated from the boat) arrived this afternoon. I had been getting grumpier about it not arriving because Chas placed the order in January, the supplier said it should arrive early March but they would try and get it to me in February. I've been trying to get hold of them for a few weeks to no joy, I swear it is probably easier to get through to BA's baggage office right now than to the PLB supplier. That has to be saying something!

More good stuff. I had some photo's done a couple of weeks ago and have received the first batch of pics on disc to check out. Looking good, even if I do say it myself. About myself.

Feeling more relaxed, but begining to mentally note there is a lot of kit to pack tomorrow, I'm off out to play this evening to enjoy a meal with friends to bid one of them farewell on his epic migration from Newbury to Winchester.

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