Singapore to Qingdao.... a race!

Well after the formal complaint to clipper about the skipper, before we set sail we had crew/skipper meeting, all views were aired and all problems discussed.  Hopefully a new start.

At race start we were 3rd over the starting line, a major improvement. A change to watches due to Keith resigning as watch leader meant that everything changed on board. Rich and Baz were watch leaders and Shaggy and me assistant watch leaders ( I was asked to be watch leader but said no, I really don't want the responsibility, too much of a bus man's holiday). As a crew we rose to the challenge and worked really hard, sitting on the rail in our time off and moving the sails to the high side to have better weight distribution. All was good as we moved into 4th place. Every half hour we reviewed the sail trim and stayed with the pack. By day 9 we were still up there with the rest, down to 7th but occasionally seeing others on the horizon really spurred us on to try harder. Even at day 15 New York and Finland were either side of us, we had a real race on our hands.

Redistributing Weight to the High Side

On Valentines day the girls bunks were decorated with hearts and balloons , a card with poems in and food served with plastic hearts to decorate. Well done Baz who went to so much trouble (you didn't think it was me did you)?


In terms of wildlife ( I know you like a wildlife section in the blog) there was very little to see although there were quite a few dolphins. On pod was huge with about 150 covering a large area around us, some of them jumping clean out of the sea. There were also a few flying fish, in rough weather we find them on the decks or sometimes if you're unlucky you get smacked around the head by one as a wave washes over the boat. One day we had a flock of immature gannets flying around and trying to catch fish which were being disturbed by the boat, quite entertaining and it helped to pass a watch.

Dolphin

Fishing boats.
There were hundreds of fishing boats, you have never seen so many dots on the radar, upto 60 at a time. Many were pair trawling (two boats with a net between) but not in the same direction so would zig zag across making navigation impossible. They had different coloured flags depending on weather they were pairs or singles, it made for interesting watches and at times we got very close to some of them. They would not alter course for us at all, we heard that Gold Coast and Geraldton just set the spinnaker and went gung ho straight through the middle.....maybe why we started to loose places at that point but not sure we could've done that!

Although we were expecting this leg to be cold it seemed to take ages to get cold but it finally arrived for my birthday and oh boy did it arrive, it got colder and colder every day that week until the day we finally arrived we were dancing on the deck in full red foulies to keep warm. My birthday on board was areal wash out, we had already been sailing at 45 degrees for a while but a real storm added to the excitement and we were just crashing into the waves. We were in survival mode with the mother watch only just managing to serve food and unfortunately not baking cake as planned. Also the magnum of champagne which David Beck's wife had won in Singapore and which we planned to open didn't seem such a good idea. Just another day at sea really apart from everyone singing happy birthday to me every half hour when I was on watch ( a tradition started of course by me.....no pulling hair though, don't have enough).

Wasn't allowed to mention it really in case the Chinese authorities wouldn't let us in but from Singapore or Batan we gained a few stow always in the shape of a rat and a family of mice! They ate the food and were seen running through the galley. We were unable to catch them as we had no traps but just outside of Qingdao we found the nest and Baz picked a couple up and I bludgeoned one to death with the bilge handle whilst shouting "Die! Die!", not surprisingly it earned me the nickname of killer. The rat we eventually managed to catch in qingdao with a trap which Catriona had brought over from B&Q for us, it's amazing what the wives do for us!

So we finished 8th but finished with 3 other boats and just the same night that Mandy and Catriona had arrived which was amazing. Unfortunately because it was such and organised welcome ceremony we weren't allowed to get in at night and so bobbed around outside overnight to be welcomed in properly in the freezing cold in the morning. It was wonderful to arrive with others and a whole day before Yorkshire and two days before Qingdao although we did have a lot of sympathy for them.

Qingdao stopover blog follows shortly!