Disco Blog Tues 09 Feb

And so it begins...... they don’t call it the ‘Roaring Forties’ for nothing.  The day opened with Red Watch, comprising Taff, Chinky and Gaz, getting rather wet as the first cold front moved through.  The Army were sitting off the port side at about 10-15 miles and in and out of sight. Gaz is now fighting fit and his Warrington humour is back on board. He smiled going off watch and headed to his bunk asking the skipper on the way, ‘Why on earth would you do this for a living?’  The sun came out but with that came the wind, steadily building from the south.  White Watch combined forces with Red for the first headsail change.  The larger No.1 Yankee was coming down and No.2 going up.  To add to the challenge the skipper decreed that it would be an ‘In-Line’ change.  In essence this means that both sails are hitched on together and one replaces the other, not easy as the wind went through Force 6 and the first proper ‘goffers’ came over the bow and down the foredeck. Wozza, Mike and Alex manned the pulpit area and got the first good salty soaking.  Jo, Chinky and Gaz manned the halyards while Taff scurried around the foredeck adjusting and trimming the sheets.  All in all a 30 minute exercise and the first real wake up call to reality in these parts.  The wind continued to build, No.3 reef went into the main, the foresail lowered and then raised.  The skipper donned his ‘foulies’ and went up to banter mercilessly Chinky and Gaz on the foredeck while Brian held helm.  Cries of ‘feel the love’ and ‘man up’ came from red-suited-bald-bloke on deck. In all that the wind touched 45 knots and the Glitzy Disco Ball that hung from the Radar has jumped overboard, never to be seen again. ‘Feel the fear’ he shouts with a large grin on his face!!! ‘Welcome Gentleman to the Southern Ocean, remember it’s an image sport.’ Alex the ‘sparky’ has had the toolbox open again. Fixing the minor battle damage he is officially the ‘Boat Handyman’. Meanwhile the Army boat has nudged in front and then off to the starboard side. We are now the most Northerly Boat. Gaz thinks he’s depressed after throwing the rubbish bin overboard and now wants to ‘officially retire’ from this game. Taff is the new Welsh God of Weather. Whenever he’s on watch the wind and rain comes in force, maybe we’ll pop him inside for a while. Chef Jim is back in the galley giving ‘ready steady cook lessons’, Chilli Con Carne for dinner followed by ‘Banoffee’ pie.  More ‘ban’ than ‘offee’ given the number of Bananas we have on board. Once again the galley has been rearranged by ‘Mother Watch’, still no sign of the ‘Phantom Custard’. Nick has just amused the watch by showing them the latest chart, nothing but ocean! So that’s about it for today. Morale is still high and the records keep tumbling. 12.8 knots to Brian on the Helm and 10.7 miles cracked in one hour by Red Watch. The sun dips over the horizon leaving ‘disco’ experiencing her biggest waves to date, a steady 35 knots from the SE.  Hope you’re all well back home, ‘Disco’ signing off.

Disco Blog Thurs 11 Feb

Ladies, gents, boys and girls, greetings from the good ship ‘Disco’.  Well, it’s been an eventful couple of days.  As we left you last the wind was building and we cracked on through the night covering some 70 miles or so to the SE.  Dawn broke and the first bad news of the day; Taff declared that we had run out of bread therefore we were to have toast at breakfast.  More seriously, as the morning progressed, it became evident that we were going to have to turn back to the west to go to the aid of the Army yacht ‘Challenger’.  Blue Watch consisting of Mike “Lee Marvin/Leslie Neilson/Pierce Brosnan’s dad” Beresford, Jase Morley and Ian “Gonzo” Stevenson ably answered the call and turned the boat around to head for Challenger, thus becoming “Baywatch”.  Challenger’s mast track was coming away and we had the best spares available to help them out. In layman’s terms, if the mast track parts company with the mast the main sail cannot be flown properly.  The skipper went up our mast to check the integrity of our rig; all was well although our skipper’s voice sounded like that of an eight year old for a while after due to the tightness of the bosun’s chair rig that hoisted him up the mast. The rendezvous with Challenger proved entertaining; two 50 ton yachts coming together in the Southern Ocean to exchange parts. With Brian helming Disco, Doc Nick tried to hurl our throwing line to Challenger.  It didn’t go very far.  So, we let the Army have a go!  The throwing line duly arrived from Challenger and Wozza passed the ‘tying-a-bowline-under-pressure’ test albeit one of the French variety and a section of new track and a rivet gun were passed yacht-to-yacht.  We then ‘held hands’ with the Army for 18 hours to provide moral support as we waited for the Navy yacht Adventurer to sail the 55 or so miles to our position because they were so far back in the race!  The Navy plan to head south to lower latitudes in the hope of catching more wind had spectacularly failed and this unfortunate rendezvous gave them a rare opportunity to catch up with Disco and Challenger.  When the Navy finally did arrive in the early hours of the morning they decided to park right next to us!  Engine on, full power, get out of this congested area!  Mikey B gave us all a lesson in how to ‘heave to’ properly and held us steady through the night.  Down below with no forward boat speed, it felt like being in a dishwasher. Dawn broke and the harsh reality was that the Army yacht Challenger was going to head west to Wellington for repairs.  Adventurer snuck away whilst Disco won the moral high ground and received three rousing cheers from the Army, which were echoed by Disco.  The 55 mile lead had been given up and we were off again, now a two horse race for ‘Cape Horn’.

A fine day followed; laundry was dried on the windward rail and, having caught up with the Navy, our two yachts stayed pretty much together. White Watch combined with Red for another sail ‘in-line’ racing change; 4 minutes from halyard release to the final crank on the raised sail.  Exhausting! Alex was ‘goffered’ up on the bow while the rest suffered the ‘burning guns’ feeling on the winches.  Although a marathon and not a sprint it’s difficult not to be competitive.  White Watch has resorted to reading up on sail trimming theory in effort to reign the Navy in.  Jo A, it turns out, is a demon cake baker producing banana cakes and pancakes for all.  We thought it was Shrove Tuesday; reality was we were still confused about the passing of the date line.  That evening Red Watch led by Taff took the helm.  With Taff on deck, the inevitable happens; the wind freshens and rain comes.  A damp night passed with the wind from the west, and yes, ‘west is best’ for all those sleeping on the starboard side.  Finally, a night without the boat trying to roll us out of our bunks!  The Navy continued to criss-cross our bows until they finally edged away as generally they were flying a little more sail and had decided to head south.  The bonus about being close together is that the banter flies across the VHF.  The first inter-Service quiz took place with the Navy winning by answering 9/10 of our Harry Potter questions.  We fared dismally answering only 5/10 of their questions on Formula 1.  One up to the Navy, the next quiz is on the 1984 Miners Strike and Lord of the Rings.  Once again that bald bloke in the red suit appeared on the foredeck, his booming voice rallying the troops during the sail change.  The ‘guns’ have started to burn during reefing, anything to take the Navy on at their own game.  Chinky has increased our yacht speed by at least half a knot by eating everything in sight, no marching to be done here!!  Maybe it’s just the cold turkey of giving up the tabs. Once again chef Jim is in the galley creating gastro delights, beef goulash followed by crumble for dinner.

Last night left most somewhat grumpy.  The wind freshened to 35 knots and the sea arrived on the starboard quarter rolling the boat from left to right.  Likened to being in a gimbling dishwasher’ little sleep was had.  With the wind howling through the rigging and the surf up, it was time to catch Brian doing 15 knots down the face of a wave.  Dawn arrived with us to find the skipper and Gonzo in the bilges carrying out repairs to the prop shaft brake.  Any man who doesn’t get seasick down there deserves a medal. Wozza was ‘goffered’ by a wave in the galley, salt water raining in through a partly open hatch whilst Chinky was seen having a nail buffed by the Doctor; quite what that was the cure for nobody knows.  Somehow, we had nudged in front of the Navy overnight, but only by a whisker.  With thousands of miles of open Pacific Ocean, the Navy had managed to get themselves back into our vicinity after a fruitless sojourn down south to find wind.  As they drew ever closer on a port tack they had to give way to calls of ‘Starboard’ over the radio from our bemused skipper.

Jason found his wandering socks and the skipper seems comfortable enough to sit on the toilet in full view thinking through his ‘battle plan’ to make the 3130 miles to the Cape first. Tonight’s quiz involves questions on ‘The Lord of the Rings’ and the “1984 Miners Strike”. Interesting topic set by the Navy. That’s about all from the good ship ‘Disco’; the Navy has gambled by heading south and is now out of sight.  We plan to hold our track, secretly hoping that they will find the eye of the next depression and run out of wind for a while.  Happy Valentines from us all, catch up with you in a few days.

Disco Blog  Mon 15 Feb

Good afternoon from ‘Discoverer’. As we go to print on the blog you will no doubt be getting ready to rise on another delightful February morning. Present position at 0410GMT on Tues 16 Feb has us at 48⁰ 07’40S 149⁰ 53.55W. The rain has eased off and we are making steady progress to the SE at around 9knts. ‘Navy’ are some 60nm to the South and slightly behind as they make small repairs to their luff boxes on their mainsail. Life here has a unique routine of 4 hour shifts for 48 hours followed by 24 hours as ‘mother watch’ looking after the rest of the crew. The short bursts of sleep seem to be getting easier although we have all had some strange dreams, especially Jo A who this morning reported that overnight she had battled out the Wimbledon final with a teaspoon! Morale is high on the ‘Big Brother Disco’ although the recent persistent rain eroded a few smiley faces, albeit only temporarily, even Gaz who has done 2 weeks sailing in his life, NZ to current position, and remains smiling! Some likened life to interrogation. First we sweat, then we get rolled from bulkhead to bulkhead, now everything is damp, still we still smile. Never surrender!! Wozza had a grumpy patch yesterday and started counting down the number of possible log entries to the Cape. He recovered when Skipper announced we shall be have a ‘Pilot and Hostie’ fancy dress party on Saturday. Special guest will be DJ Symes complete with his Ipod and on his 24hr sugar high following pear crumble (yes this man has had many lives!!).  Still we continue to utilise the skills of folk onboard. Bread now has to be baked daily, with chef Jim giving the lessons in the galley eagerly watched by all.  Chinky has side burns appearing and is planning to enter the South American ‘Elvis’ lookalike competition, that’s if he can find the hair wax in the ‘Chinky Admin Vortex’ that is his bunk.  Brian caught a bird today on his fishing line but successfully got the somewhat irate ‘birdy’ back in one piece, well done brain.  Instinctively Alex was standing by with the winch handle, rations are not that low Al!! Our new friend Albert Ross watched the events from his birds-eye view and was especially amused when Chinky was tasked with launching a pot of rotten red cabbage and apple chutney, removing the lid he prepared for a powerful over arm launch, and threw it all over his back, his watchmates and the deck ... just as well it was sweet smelling then!!  Talking of sweet smelling and roses the crew had a romantic Valentines Day, waking up to Valentines Day cards with the inspired poem ‘Waypoints are red, Southern Ocean is blue, Leg 8 is awesome and so are you!!!’, signed the good ship Disco, she is looking after us very well!

The winds are staying fair, so fair in fact that it is sometimes tricky to work out which way is downwind, as discovered by doc Jo when her snowball became a Boomerang!  Taff took it one step further freaking out Mikey B by covering tissue in choc icing and aiming it straight for him!!  Duck!!  That is not all that has been flying around the cockpit, in the last couple of days there have been a couple of hours of good drying weather and so the laundry begins, base layers and pants hoisted all over the place, including Jasons socks!

After his valiant efforts in stopping the engine from catching fire and spending hours in the bilges without a hint of seasickness Engineer Gonzo has transformed the washing up by making a plug for the sink! Not only does this stop the dirty water coming back up but is great for water conservation.  Amazing what a bit of wood and gaffer tape can do!

And so we continue, Jibing our way through the last of the roaring 40s towards the furious 50s, dodging the squalls, or not, chasing the wind, watching the fronts come through, trying to break top speed so far 15 kts, beef stew tonight!!  All the best to you all and will write again soon! xx

Individual Shout Outs

From Gonzo: Love to Laura X, big tin of Tuna to the cats.  Hello to all the boys and girls at CMU, RAF Marham. Hello to Mum, Dad, Mark & Liz, Mel, Phil & Jellitot, Nan, Andrew, Carol & Hannah, Julie, Dave, Rebecca & Rachel.  Hello to Fliss & Pru back in Lynn.

From Brian: Happy Valentines Pauline – love and miss you lots; promise lots of flowers and champagne on my return xxxxx.  Oli, hope you’re looking after mum and Whisper.  Emma, Chris and Mike, love you all so much.  FSC Boys and Manning, keep working hard as someone has to while I’m sailing!

From Nick: Happy Valentines and loads of Love to Adele.  Hope you have a great time at the Wags do.  Big Hi to Ralph, Jo, Harriet and Rory and send love to Mum & Dad. Having a blast out here.

From Mike: Happy Valentines to my darling Helen with loads of love and hugs. We are now in the roaring forties and the power of the ocean is upon us.  Send my love to Toby, Mum and Barrie. Hope Meg & Bruno is looking after you while I am away. Xxx 3100 to the Cape

From Jason: Happy Valentines Joan, hope your new job is going well.  Hi to all of the family.  All is going well on the good ship disco, but I could murder a wee dram!

From Mikey B: Hi Guys, hope you are having a great half-term.  Hope SH dropped off my Valentine Card babe – missing you.  Nick: no Whales yet but lots of Albatross; Chris:  Dolphins a bit shy down here, none yet.  Hope you both looking after Mum.  Love you all Dad xxxx

From James: Helen, thanks for all the presents some of those have come in rather handy, love and kisses to you.  M & C yes it is lumpy down here but I’m staying clipped on.  A big ‘piratey shout-out’ and kisses to little Emily and her keepers Lynne and Paul.  Love also to Paula and Heidi, happy valentines to you all, see you soon. J... out

From Jo A: Would like to thank Jo Doc’s friend Jo in Auckland for taking us to the gardening centre in Auckland; the knee pads are a god send! Thanks Pete for the Valentines Card, hope all is well! To mum and dad – no torpedoes or submarines as yet!! X Scotland for the grand slam!

From Gaz: Apologies for not writing anything before but now I’ve finally found my sea legs I just want to send my love to my mum, dad and brother and say hi to everyone back home and at Waddo.  Having a great time and don’t worry mum, no sign of pirates!!

From Chinky (Gareth): HAPPY VALENTINES DAY KATIE! Sorry I can’t be there. I will make it up to you when I get back “wink, wink”! I’m missing your sexy little arse so much, can’t wait to give it a good spankin! Say hello to mum and the rest of the family. Tell Emma to be good!  Take care baby, I’ll see you soon!!

From Taff: Hope your all ok?  Everything fine here on the ultimate cruise!  Book caravan for Easter at Tantallon?  Love and miss you all xxxxxx.

From Alex: Hi all.  Everything going well and as expected, feels like a long time since seeing you all. Looking forward to catching up on my return.  Happy belated Valentines Toni.

From Jo R:  Hello!  Like Jo said, knee pads are ace, thanks Joey!!  Mum, Dad and Winnie – no whales or dolphins yet but lots of birds, good luck with the exam results Winnie!!   Dad, will call in a couple of days for the code if no luck sending it, thank you for sorting it out!!  Hope all is well, pat to Meg! Lorna, Al, Emma and Adrian, hope you’re having a super time in Zambia and Uganda!!!xx

From Wozza: Hi to everybody in particular Ian, Carey, Anna and Esmy. Hope your all well. Esmy how goes the Chamonix house hunt. Hello again to mum, dad and Sis. Sis the Iphone got trashed but hopefully get you via someone. All those at VS keep up the good work and keep the right hand seat warm, I miss Honkers!! Hi Lucy hope bambino number 3 is going well. Greetings to Mattly, John and Monty in Acton town. How is the cabin crew training going? Catch up with you all in the next blog. The whole adventure is as advertised and certainly a challenge! TTFN Wx