That is the situation for us on Ericsson 3. We have managed, with a massive effort from our shore crew, to get the boat ready in just a couple of days. We have sailed the boat to China with just seven sailing crewmembers. We have been through heavy sail changes in complete darkness and biting cold winds of 30 knots.
It is foggy both outside and inside. One thing is worse than another. This morning our navigator Aksel Magdahl had to keep his eyes on the radar all the time so we wouldn’t collide with any ships. Visibility was just couple of hundred metres and ships were suddenly appearing a bit too close.
It’s been a race against odds for the past two weeks to get Ericsson 3 (Magnus Olsson/SWE) repaired, back in the water and to Qingdao in time for the start of leg five. The team restarted leg four on 11 February at 2344 GMT from position 25 51.94N 121 52.97E. The boat will cross the line in Qingdao, repack the boat and then restart leg five as soon as possible.
Place: Taiwan, Hualien. Time: five in the morning. It is completely dark, rain is drizzling down and the temperature has suddenly dropped 10 degrees. But, the heat is on. In a few hours this mission will reach one of its most crucial points.
It feels a bit strange being the only ones left out racing. For a start, there is no reason to look at the position reports every three hours as we know where we are – well we do most of the time when the GPS works.
We were nearly becalmed for half an hour, with 30 miles to go, but now we have some nice breeze again. To make it even trickier a thick fog has rolled in. Will this leg never stop giving us a break?
A short update from the fine Lady Telefónica Blue. As I write we have only six knots of breeze, and for sure will have another loss in the next sched against the two boats behind us.
Well the Dragon has made it across. We are all pretty happy and have just been taking it all as one step at a time.
The last five hours have been more eventful onboard Ericsson 4 than the rest of the day.
It has been a glamour day, sailing in blue skies and flat water. Most of the time we sailed with our code zero and staysail, but now have hoisted our big spinnaker and are still making good mileage to the finish.
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