2002
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Ocean Planet Report
Ocean Planet Around Alone Log
October 13, 2002
Brixham, England
Hi everyone. This will be a short one, as I am pretty beat.
The start of Leg Two was postponed for 24 hours till noon tomorrow (Monday) due to a vicious low pressure system that came through. Good thing as there was no way they would have gotten us off the docks, it was howling! In fact, this evening there was panic on the docks as the wind clocked (and built up to around 50kts!!) to the worst direction possible for the marina sending in sizeable waves right into the docks. All the boats raced to rig extra docklines, fenders, as the boats reared up and bashed against the pontoons with terrific force. It got so bad that Reg Hill, the area head for HM’s Coast Guard made the call to activate a large group of guards to come down and help.
Ocean Planet is fine, but today was wild as we struggled in the wacky weather to get ready for the start. I am lucky that there was a postponement since we had so much work to do. But we are getting close. There is still a lot to do so making the start tomorrow (if not postponed again) will be tight! But it is more important to have the boat really ready to go than to start in a compromised state and risk losing time dealing with things that aren’t right. It’s a long way to Cape Town!
There is so much to tell about what has been going on…..maybe I’ll have more time to write after I start!
About to pass out. More soon, I promise,
Bruce