| At sea. Atlantic Rowing Race: Row 4 Cancer crashing and banging forward |
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| Sunday, 08 January 2006 | |
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Liz and Richard: "Very quick update today as I am writing this from the (non) comfort of a rolling and pitching cabin! As you will no doubt see from the Woodvale website we are currently making good progress towards Antigua and have done for several days. This is brilliant, we are so pleased to be moving fast again! But this speed has some huge costs. For example we have had between 25 and 35 knots of wind from the East over the past week, this makes the boat (move fast yes) but also an incredibly uncomfortable and sometimes dangerous place to be. Because we have had this consistent wind for a week the sea state has built into something that rather resembles a mountain range, as seen from an aeroplane. Standing peaks of white water, with no rhythm or pattern to them at all. One would have thought that the waves would become settled after a sustained period but no, they get more and more confused! I am sure we have all experienced this strength wind from time to time, either on or off the water, but the difference is apart from being in a rowing boat, we can't go home at the end of the day have a hot shower good meal and begin again tomorrow. We can't ask Poseidon to "please turn the wind and waves off for a minute, to enable me to carry out my morning necessities without getting soaked whilst on the bucket"! In short it is exhausting. Last night produced the strongest wind and largest waves yet, and whilst this is just about manageable whilst the moon is up (until about 03:30 last night), it is just plain dangerous when pitch black. If you cannot see the waves coming you get hit from all sides and it is just not worth breaking an oar (or anything else for that matter) still this far out of Antigua. So at 05:00 we set the boat up to look after itself as best we could and hid in the cabin until it was light enough to row again. Based on the fact that the boat, by herself, covered 12 miles in 5 hours you get an idea of how windy it was! Inside the cabin is not a great experience in those conditions. Yes we try and get some sleep, but you wake up about every 10 mins as waves thud into the boat vibrating the plywood that you are leaning on and another half ton of water crashes over the deck! Anyway we were off rowing again once light enough to be able to and we can only hope that soon we get a break from the all or nothing conditions we have been having .... now might be a good time to stop those wind dances - those who have been helping us out!! Quick FFK Update - it was a disastrous night for FF fans everywhere as, through sea conditions or just plain lack of directional stability, dawn revealed 4 flying fish on board Bilbo! So overall score now stands at: Bilbo - 86 Flying Fish - 32 (could this be the end of Flying Fish KC) Love to all at home ... Happy relaxing Sunday!!?!? L & R xxx" Row 4 Cancer is crewed by Richard Mayon-White and Liz O'Keeffe from Southampton UK Stephen Davies http://www.row4cancer.com/ Event website http://www.atlanticrowingrace.co.uk |
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| Last Updated ( Sunday, 08 January 2006 ) |
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