2 days into the race and Escapado and her crew are still in Las Palmas making repairs. I definitely dodged a bullet with that one. After leaving her in St Tropez, she sailed to Malta and competed in the Middle Sea Race before making her way back to Gibraltar and eventually Las Palmas. The race and resumed mile builder proved to be tough and together with a delayed arrival, the crew wouldn’t have had enough time to leave on the 24th.
So far, I have been on the bow doing the same job as I did in St Tropez. Hoisting and bringing down sails. This is an endurance race however, and no one will have “set jobs”. We have already used a J2 racing jib, the code zero and one of our 4 symmetrical spinnakers. At the moment, we are slowly moving on with full mainsail and a symmetric spinnaker. I am so glad that I got to use new sails in St Tropez and therefore have at least some knowledge of how to sail with spinnakers. The symmetrical spinnakers are a piece of work to sail with. Small adjustments on the helm coupled with a favourable sea state ensure that we don’t wrap them around the forestay. These are powerful sails that need to be understood and respected. The weather has been wonderful, with clear skies and good visibility.
