Iker Martinez on washing duty onboard Telefonica Blue, on leg 5 of the Volvo Ocean Race, from Qingdao to Rio de Janeiro. Image copyright Gabriele Olivo/Telefonica Blue/Volvo Ocean Race.
by Bouwe Bekking (skipper)
Today was Tom’s (tom Addis – navigator) birthday, and he was lucky that his wife and daughter had prepared a nice package for him. Jono (Jonathan Swain) reckoned it was his last present, as once you are past 40 this kind of things start slipping through, so he better should enjoy it. We were all on deck for the occasion and sang happy birthday for him. He seemed to be content with his gift, especially the drawing of his daughter and pictures from the entire family made him smile.
On deck David (David Vera) has been busy fixing one of the lifting posts for the daggerboard. The hoisting line jumped the sheave, so there was a little crack in the post itself. He seems to be happy that he can fix something, as finally he has something else to do than just trim, grind and drive. The next 24-36 hours will become a bit trickier, as we are approaching a ridge of high pressure, and we will slow down considerably. We haven’t been going very flash in the last 36 hours and had a lot of losses in mileage, time to turn that around again.
For the rest not much happening here, no sealife anymore, not even a single bird, they are smart enough to hang around the islands. In not too much time we will see the big albatrosses again, a thing I am looking forward t. They are just magnificent gliders; it must be beautiful feeling to fly around without having to flap their wings, and to see other birds work like crazy to stay airborne.
Volvo Ocean Race
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