TRYBOOKING update 11 July 2014 in the 2014 Melbourne to Vanuatu race

Day 10 - 9th July Tuesday - continued

I realised that in my rambling about missing the modern day life of chit chat via txt msg was basically another way of describing home sickness, meaning, I missed talking to my wife each day and getting non-descriptive holiday updates from my daughter in Europe, other than, "Dad I need help with something", or "Dad I need money".

We are fast approaching New Caledonia and I don't believe I am saying this, but the weather is going to be lovely over the next 4-5 days, and what I want, is more of the bad stuff, so we can storm up to Port Villa.

It feels like we have been sprinting for 1,500nm, and by later today we will jogging, and tomorrow we will be down to a walk for the rest of the trip, all I hope is its not a crawl.

Good progress considering the wind is fluctuating from 10-14 knots, we should be at our first waypoint through New Caledonia tomorrow midday.

Louise and I took a stack of avocado's and beans and sour cream and made nachos for everyone for lunch. It was very tasty, as I found 2 stray tomatoes in the fridge that were diced for the top.

Afternoon was slow and boring and I just want bad weather!! So everyone I sense was quiet and reflective that its going to be a slog to Port Villa from here with light weather. Guys, lets do another movie. Out came the projector, and this time we reduced the screen to a sheet clamped to the dodger, which gave us a 50inch TV screen. We sat in the cockpit, broke out the beers and a gin & tonic, and with pop-corn, snakes, bananas (lollies) we sat back in the cockpit and watched a recent Jeff Bridges movie called "Crazy Heart" about a country and western singer. Pete manned the helm for most of the movie, and I took over towards the end. Very easy as boat speed was in the 4-5 knot range.

It does seem crazy that we are yacht racing with many comforts of home, but it does come with a shocking roster for sleeping and watch keeping.

Day 11 - 10th July - Wednesday

Well a lot of the night things were progressing closely, weather is running out of puff. We are still progressing slowly at 3-4 knots and we decide to deploy the Zero (Code Zero sail). That worked for a while, then the wind drops further and we don't want to flog it, we tried that during the Hobart race and gave it need for repair. Back to the Head sail, and we suffer on, this is not what the boat excels at. What did I say about a crawl, well we are there. The expectation of getting into the New Caledonia area today has slipped a day. There is no wind and no boat speed.

We saw a school of 5-6 fish following us at 1 knot at lunch, I think they were dolphin fish or mahi mahi, but smaller (don't quote me). Chilli Chick pea and rice for lunch. Grant has just finished the layering of pastry for the croissants for tomorrow, that has taken three days of preparation, and if you now how to make home made croissants, that is 54 layers of pastry, each one with a butter layer between it!!!!

ESCAPADE has caught us overnight, within 4nm, and I doubt we will hold her out tonight. She is lighter and points better, and it is just a matter of time before she jumps us.

Afternoon has been painful and finally we were East of the lay line and decided to head West of the line for our final push into our New Caledonian waypoint. At the pace we were heading we had predicted 24 hours, we were averaging 1.3 knots.

Lunch was a chick pea and rice dish, and I had 2 of those. We have settled into having a main meal late afternoon. Breakfast and late Lunch are filled with minor snacks, but that appears to be sufficent for everyone.

We were now determine to run a tack to the West, as the sun set with 2 holes in the clouds allowing bright orange beams through to the cloud ceiling above, it looked just like the Japanese flag, so as we settled for a long night, out comes a can or two of Jim Beam, and the obligatory GT with vinegar chips. As we sat back and contemplated how very close we were to New Caledonia, someone suggested a glass of red and another movie night, hey we are on this tack for hours, so we setup as per the night before and watched seventies Al Pacino movie - "Dogs Day", it had felt like it today.

Pete is helming, how did he get that job again, and during the movie, two crew headed down so they were prepared for their roster shifts.

About 30 minutes into the movie the wind shifted and built from the North, by end of movie we had 20 knots of wind and 7 knots of boat speed and a realisation that we could be at the entrance to New Caledonia within 5 hours at the pace were heading.

The preparation for entering the slot into the passage had been allocated to tomorrow's task, but fortunately I had prepared a route, so we checked and double checked and feed way points to the helming station by hand, as the 2 units are independent. We would most likely be doing a night passage .... famous last words. The run from the South was hampered by the wind angle and we need to tack to run east across the entrance before turning in, we attempted to enter the bay and found the current running at us at 2kts, so we kept an Easterly tack and decide to push that direction with the speed we had.

During the night I rotated through 2 shifts and when I left at 4am, I knew we would be seeing the channel between the islands until day break.

Day 12 - 11 July - Thursday

I awoke at 6:30am, peaked out the cabin window and could only see the sea. Where are the islands I was expecting. I dress casual lightly with tee shirt only and head into the cockpit. Grant is about to come off his shift and Louise will stay up when Stu arrives.

I check the helm station plotter and we are beating across the bottom of New Caledonia to go around. Apparently the Northerly and current flowing out of the bay meant it looked like a detour around the islands. I note a current on our nose of 2.5kts, we certainly have the angle and with discussion we decide to tack and see where that out us, and that is where this update stops. we are heading for our next waypoint through the islands of New Caledonia.

We have a Sched in 15mins - 08:00 - and we will discover the damage of the past few days, all I can say is, it could be worse, we could have been sitting off the New Caledonian coast patrolling it for days!!!!

Ok so not great, ESCAPADE have jumped ahead of us, and the others are progressing on the final 280nm from the passage to Port Villa.

This decision to tack and head through the passage has been a good one. we scurried through our music collections to find some French related song, and whilst we played these and organised coffee and tea, Grant finally presented, fresh from the oven, his croissants. The first batch tasted beautiful, but need a little crisping. The second batch was magnificent, you could see the 54 layers (or maybe 5) and these were so crisp. Jam and croissants, what else you do you need on a race yacht !!!!

The final submission will be in the day heading into Port Villa.

Duane

Final Report from JAZZ PLAYER-TPF in the 2014 Melbourne to Vanuatu race

After 10 days, 6 hrs of racing, we crossed the finish line at the entrance to Port Vila harbour in the early evening of Thursday.

The last day we had nice 10-15kt easterlies which allowed us to make good speed to the finish - 7 to 9 knots all day. This appears to have been a narrow escape from the high pressure and light winds that have now taken hold of the fleet. Our passage through Noumea was slow but steady and we were pleased when the easterly filled in Wednesday evening. It was unusual crossing the line in the dark, taking our own finish time. We had to drop anchor overnight in the harbour as Customs had gone home. Sadly, this meant another lamb shank dinner (trust me, it was getting tedious). A nearby cruising boat delivered a few welcome beers and by 930pm, it was bed time.

We have reflected a little on this sailing adventure of the last 10 days and it's fair to say that it's something both of us will remember for a long time.

It was a tough race and aside for the last 2 days, was nothing like the 'brochure'.

On behalf of Matt L and I, thanks to everyone for following us on Facebook and your messages of support.

Thanks also to the ORCV for organising this great race. And finally, to Andrew Lawrence for so generously lending his boat to Matt and I.

Until next time.

Cheers,

Matt and Matt.  

Many thanks to Denise Setton for the above photo.

Thanks also to Paul Whybird, crew memeber on the retired GEOMATIC, now in Port Vila, for the 2 photos below.

2014 Melbourne to Vanuatu Update from CARTOUCHE 11 July, 2014

I apologies that it has taken 12 days to do the first update, but here we go.

For those that don't know we race the boat with two shifts of 4 people. 3 hours on and 3 hours off, 24 hours a day.

The race started well with us leaving the Port Phillip Heads in second place closely behind ALIVE.

Our progress through Bass Straight went well and quicker than expected.

Then things became a little more serious South of Gabo Island known for its treacherous seas. Full wet weather gear and thermals was the required attire, traditional Melbourne ocean racing dress code.

In 40 to 45 knots of wind (80-90km/h) we needed to down sail by putting in a 2nd reef in the mainsail. This is more difficult on CARTOUCHE as it has a furling main sail that requires us to go from 1st reef to full sail before we can go to the second reef. This process was hard and required all hands on deck but after a lot of hard work we were ready to continue racing.

In the washing machine sea state of at least 5-6 metres, a rouge wave hit the boat causing the boat to crash gibe. The preventer rope that we had in place to prevent the boom from crashing from one side of the boat to the other broke and the boom slammed with the force of 8 to 10 tonne from one side of the boat to the other.
The main sheet (ropes) collected Leeton on the way through and pinned him between the sheets and the fiberglass seats of the boat. He seemed quite badly injured at this stage with severe chest and back pain so we headed under sail towards Eden.
By time we were nearing Eden it was apparent that his injures were not critical but were still somewhat serious so it was decided by all that we head up close to the coast to maintain close access to the mainland if we needed to access medical help. By time we were just south of Sydney Leeton had had a few days in bed and had begun raiding the medical cabinet. He convinced the skipper and crew that it was safe to continue racing to Vanuatu. With this in mind we aimed for Lord Howe Island as our next safety checkpoint. We knew that this was going to leave us becalmed for at least a day but everyone agreed that it was the safest course of action for our injured crewmate.

Night 10 was the first night we didn't need to don our wet weather gear to survive. Some who shall remain nameless to protect the Innocent celebrated this by sailing in their underwear. The light winds certainly came with a vengeance and as Leeton's health improved our lack of wind increased. In the true spirit of Cartouchion crew it was time to confront the lack of wind with a swim off the back. Tom and Mark prepared a roast in the oven. A civilized meal with read wine, fit for kings.
Then to top things off, Leeton made some freshly baked bread to have with vegemite -- "Ahh the serenity"

We had either had near to no wind or too much. Next was a belt of too much wind. Our excitement grew with the burst of 30knot winds and we reefed early to err on the side of caution. With Nick, Damon, Simon and Steven on deck we were suddenly smacked with 50knots in 1 gust tearing our head sail. The crew quickly got it in but not before we had 6 tears in it 1 of them major on the leach line.
Winds in that storm continued for over an hour reaching up to 59knots (110km/h).

Steven and Leeton spent 3 hours repairing the sail with wonderful success. Now named "FrankinSail" and with some accidental phallic shaped repairs it was hoisted back up and driving us in the now ridiculously light winds once again.

Day 11 provided the crew with some much need excitement and moral boost. Just south of New Caledonia a whale came swimming within 100m of the boat for about 15 minutes. Tom was incredibly scared but with Kate's encouragement they went for a swim with the whale - kinda.

We have all struggled with the light winds and such a heavy yacht and spend way too much time wishing for heavy winds. The silliness when becalmed has overtaken us all at times. We resorted last night to drinking some "Dark and Stormy's" (Rum and Ginger beer) to tempt the weather gods.

Food has been fantastic we have had everything from Indian cuisine, roast beef, salads, fresh baked bread, porridge, pizza salads, gnocchi, salads, fruit and wraps.

As we drift towards Vanuatu with an expected ETA as predictable as the trifecta on cup day.

2014 Vanuatu Weather Outlook Thursday 11 July 2014

With slow progress of the fleet over the last 24 hours around the southern end of New Caledonia, here's a very timely weather outlook from our resident gurus Andrew Roberts and Robin Hewitt.

	The horses appear to have gone north!  The Horse Latitudes that is, also known as the variables of Capricorn, as an area of variable winds where the westerlies meet the trades. This includes a large band of variables around the South of New Caledonia, right where the bulk of the fleet is. Whilst the Horse Latitudes typically occur between 30° to 35° South, the sustained run of Low Pressure Systems pushing North up into the Tasman Sea have pushed this more into the 20° to 30° South band.
	Moderate E-SE trade winds of around 15 knots have been persisting over Southern Vanuatu waters, but getting into this breeze from the light and variable windholes around the bottom of New Caledonia will be testing, particularly with the strong currents that also run in this area. Prognosis suggests SE’s should establish South beyond New Caledonia, but this may not happen until Saturday.
	Currents to negotiate in this part of the South Pacific includes the South Equatorial Current, which runs through and South of the Vanuatu chain and along the East coast of New Caledonia.  Jets split off north and south of New Caledonia, with the North Caledonian Jet and South Caledonian Jet rounding the top and bottom of the island, respectively, and setting westward. Tides are semi-diurnal in New Caledonian waters, and tidal streams can be anticipated to be running strong with spring tides from a full moon on Saturday.  The nearby Havannah Passage in the southeast corner of the island is known to run strong at 4-6 knots in such conditions.