Monaco, 11 Februari, 2010
This morning, when we took the boat to the port of Monaco (We love public transport by boat…) the driver told us that the weather forecast for this day we will see some snow in the afternoon, and snow we got! It snows like 2 times in 10 years in Monaco and we experienced one of these days… You wouldn’t believe it if we didn’t show you any pictures, but yesterday we were walking around in our T-shirt, today it was foul weather gear and beenies on for the crew of the Mummaduck.
We started with the weigh in of the crew at the Monaco Yacht Club; we got a total of 515 kilograms, which is 10 kilograms below the limit. Thijs was the loser of the day being the heaviest crewmember. Ties and Pieter ended their weight drop of the last couple of weeks spending lots of hours in the gym on an equal level both weighing 80.1 kilograms, so I guess they have to drink the bottle of wine together some time..
With some minor engine troubles we left the harbor around 11 am for some training. Due to a lot of strange weather systems around Monaco the wind was quite fluky. We went out with jib no. 1 on but within 3 minutes after we started sailing a squall came over which brought us like 25 knots of breeze. To spare our jib we headed down for some nice downwind sailing. Unfortunately we were flying the light spinnaker and 25 knots is definitely too much for her, so we took her down too. It was a nice wake-up call after two months of no sailing, I can tell you that!
Luckily the wind settled down a bit and with another jib on we could continue our session. It’s for sure that it’s going to be tough sailing the next few days. With a big swell rolling in from a south easterly direction and wind waves coming in from every direction possible because the wind shifts continuously in direction and strength! So that’s quite a challenge.
Around 2 pm we ended the training because it was really getting cold. We headed back to the harbor and then the snow really kicked in. So we cleaned the boat, checked the sails and the safety for the races tomorrow and went back to the hotel. Thijs and Remko headed for Nice for some spare parts for our engine but that all worked out well so no worries on that anymore… at least we hope!
On our way back to the hotel we shot some really nice shots of a part of the crew in foul weather gear in front of the casino and palm trees covered under a layer of snow. That’s something you’ll experience not too many times in your live so that was pretty cool.
Tomorrow the races start at 10 am. Please keep on following us by Twitter, Facebook and of course our own website!
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