update from YOLO (from Dale - yay) 8 January 2014

 

Apologies for very little news from the boat since the start.

So a brief run down from the start;

Start day was overwelming with so many boats on the water jockeying to get a prime position to watch, at time getting in the way of the competitors.

Yolo had a good start but as a smaller boat we were quickly rolled by the larger boats, which in turn left her in bad air turbulence, so quickly thrust Yolo back in the fleet. At the first mark, we opted not to gybe straight away like the rest of the fleet, good hoist of the kite, went a bit further and then gybed. This seem to have paid as we sailed in unaffected airs and got through a big chunk of the fleet. The last of the bay legs was sublime.. then into the big ocean..  light wind beated for a few hours, then the breeze started to freshen.. later in the night it had shifted and increased. We opted to run with it.. not that strong, but seas were a bit messed up. We ended up sailing into lighter breeze the next day and night..

followed by thirty plus knots and lots of rain.. and eventually squalls of 50knots and sustaining 42 for long periods of time.. it rained consistency.

The deck was either awash with rain or the waves that were hitting up against us, we were making some Westing to break the pattern. By later in the day the winds had started to ease and by late Tuesday the kite was up and very little water on the deck.. Last night we kited till we had some strong gusts so opted on the conservative route.. (Sailing Double handed means you need to be extra vigilant.)

 

Late yesterday PM Yolo was able to hoist kite in 20 knot conditions.. with her making good miles.. close to midnight the kite was dropped as the breeze had picked up a bit.

The rest of the night had good averages.. We are planning on taking the north routing around the high. All well aboard.