Allure Day 2

ALLURE DAY 2 - JIM BARBER WRITING FIRST BLOG EVER

Full foul weather gear, all our warm cloths, on Gowie says more gear than skiing. This is typical of the first couple days, defiantly not the tropical conditions we will get into soon and why we go on this race. Strong and gusty wind in the high teens and 20+ Jim Morgan hit 18.8 knots speed with the small #3 jib and the boat is going great. We are north of where traditional routing would take us, but confident we'll pay off later, but we'll have to see about that. Gowie, Hooner and Barber sick as dogs…bad night last night. The boat smells bad because of the mystery water coming in…all fixed now sort of, and we have to bail and sponge it out, not a pleasant job. So the boat is on its ear going fast but very and I mean very uncomfortable down below. Getting dressed in full gear, harness, head lamp, gloves, etc. is a real chore in pitch dark inside what feels like a barrel being kicked down the road. Lots of bumps and bad language. I'm appalled. Second day meals postponed again until tomorrow. No one wants to try and cook anything.

At 10am we did a sail change from the big #1 jib to the small #3 and that was a real adventure in wind and waves crashing over the bow. Took 4 guys on the foredeck to wrestle the big heavy jib on deck and folded. Took about 30 min of manpower…Eric leading the foredeck crew and doing a superstar effort.

Al is our navigator and is up almost constantly working his computer getting us to the right point on the course for the first real strategic decision of where to enter the constant off shore wind synoptic wind its called where it will turn more Easterly from north and we'll set our spinnaker and start surfing toward Hawaii.

So now its 6:00 am Sunday and what a difference from yesterday. The wind has swung around enough behind us to set a chicken chute - that's a small spinnaker of very heavy material that allows us to sail close to the wind The call is made and up it goes with the #3 jib down. That sets the boat rocketing forward Al driving hits 22 knots of boat speed in 25 knots of wind right off the bat. It's hard to control for those of us with no experience on this boat in a blow with a chute up and a very difficult quarter sea behind us kicking the stern up, the bow down pushing the bow deep toward the water and making the boat want to sort of pitch pole…not really but that's what it feels like. What actually happens is the boat rounds up into the wind tipping way over flogging the sails and making for a tense few moments until the sheets are eased and the boat comes back up on its feet. Well, yours truly got on the wheel and 5 minutes later that's exactly what happened. Very embarrassing but I get the feeling it won't be the last round-up on this trip. Jim M, Al and Eric have some good experience on this boat in weather, but the rest of us have not. Believe it or not, boats have their own personality and handling traits that need getting used to. These are all very good sailors on Allure and have many thousands of miles on races like this, but still it is a learning experience. That's all for now. Jim

PS from navigator - Watermaker operational after finding booby-trap! A ground wire had an inline fuse holder apart, without fuse. Found only fuse that would fit in the chart table cubby. Real Cute! - DG???

----------
radio email processed by SailMail
for information see: http://www.sailmail.com