Two more days to go

Lia Ditton's latest diatribe from the trimaran Shockwave in the Faraday Mill OSTAR

Lia has passed south of Sable Island and has just called in to say how excited she was last night as she was creaming along at 16 knots, but with the onset of day the wind has dropped off again. Shockwave has less than 400 miles to go and Lia's latest ETA at her current speed gives a Saturday evening arrival in Newport:

'You mean The Navionics,' not to be confused with The Stereophonics or The Semiosonics? Is it too a 90's rock group or a guitar/funk garage-revival band? ' You might be thinking. Navionics Gold in your mind, therefore being the double platinum CD perhaps, like David Bowie Gold or Queen: Gold Album [They're greatest ever hits]. Or maybe you're not into music, so you remark, 'I didn't get my Navionics Gold,' I only got the Duke of Edinburgh award, Silver or ' I think my grandmother prefers Cadbury's Milk Tray.'

Navionics Gold is not a contender for Glastonbury, a box of dark chocolates with caramel centres, nor a medal acquired by swimming 48 lengths of a pool. Navionics Gold is the logo plastered along 'Shockwave's' boom, and it is an electronic cartography system for chart plotters like Raymarine TV. If my C70 Raymarine Chartplotter is your Sony Widescreen in metallic, then the Navionics Gold electronic chart, on a chip, is like inserting The Perfect Storm on DVD. For a chartplotter without a chart, is like watching in the middle of the night, the 'Programme Time-Out' still with the coloured stripes and the little girl on BBC2. During my qualifier, I managed to convince the local marine electronics store, Greenham & Regis to lend me a Solent Demo Chart. 'The electronic chart is an aid to navigation designed to facilitate the use of authorised government charts, NOT to replace them,' is the blurb that pops up on the screen when the power is switched on. Admittedly between the 'Cancelled' paper charts I had picked up for £2 a shot [we are on a budget here!] and the Solent Demo chart, my qualifying route to Fastnet rock and back was as glamorous as following the contour lines of a potato and one that put me inland a few times at that. So it was a welcome moment last night, when I tacked to go South of Sable Island that I could switch chart from UK SW & Ireland to US NE & Canyons, in expectation of clearing Canada later today. [Thank you Lance at Navionics.co.uk]
 
'This could be the best day of your entire summer!' Ainslie Randel with his Californian-surfer drawl, used to tell me every morning while we worked together on the Bright Star, R/P 78ft sled. It was with this attitude that I sat on deck this morning in the fresh air [and we are talking frruhressh here- hat, body warmer and socks being necessary accessories] to enjoy the sunshine. The clouds were in good formation to be a copy of the sky in the Simpson's cartoon, the sea relatively flat and so Shockwave was creaming along at a casual 8 knots, no spray.

Singing in the shower is a common past time enjoyed by many and a session on deck Shockwave, being akin to having a shower, I often find myself [when nothing is going wrong] warbling my humble repertoire. If U2's Beautiful day [the tune Rob Gale chose to
accompany the DVD of classic offshore snap-shots] were to summerise a summer of racing on Bright Star,  I was wondering in a 'you're on Desert Island Discs' sort of way, what music association would remind me of this voyage. Suggestions ranged from 'The Death of Rock & Roll,' and the lyrics, ..'I did the material trip and THE earning the money. So I decided to take off on my bicycle...' to a current dance hit with the line, 'Let's get this par-dy star-ded!' Baz Luhrman again with 'Enjoy the Power & beauty of your Youth, Oh never mind! You will not understand the Power & Beauty until it has past...' and a touch more euphoria with the equally unforgettable trance anthem, 'You're FREE to do what you WANNA do!' 'Remember the Days' [Nelly Furtado] took me onto a more nostalgic note, along with Bob Dylan's 'Like a Rolling Stone,' and the wafting vocals of Groove Armada repeating, 'If you're fond of sand dunes and salty air...' As the wind shifted, indicative of 'Time to trim a few sails,' I was reminded of the belter, 'I get knocked down, but I get up again' and the Supergrass hit, 'We're on green, we've got teeth, nice and clean...' To conclude, I haven't decided yet, but with 480 miles to go, there is still time. 

The delivery back to England is a top subject among Team Shockwave shore crew at the moment. In an ideal world, the float-on 'DockExpress' yacht transporter, would be calling in at Jamestown circa July 10th and Lia with Shockwave [in an ideal world, a fully-funded programme] would be mooring into its hold, rig up, fenders out and the cabin stuffed with a few paperbacks, cushions and all sorts of delectable food stuffs [that don't require cooking]. Lia would then be looking forward to the cushiest transatlantic ever and with towel and bikini under one arm, stepping off Shockwave's port float and heading for the pool every morning. [There is a pool, right?!] For lunch Lia might join Penny and Sam aboard their Frers 77 for a spot of home-made lasagne or go and hang out with delivery crew Leon and Paul on the Sunseeker 52 to catch an afternoon film on satellite television. Instead, Shockwave is alas facing a haul-out [to inspect the daggerboard casing] and a rig-off [to re-bed the mast base], whose crack has now spread from the front of the mast to the back on the entire starboard side. As to whether the owner [I have only chartered Shockwave], Abraham, [Team Shockwave's shore crew manager] or myself, in any combination, will sail the boat back has yet to be decided. 'Is it possible to share an 8ft by 3ft cabin of living space?' Asks she who has just spent 2,200 miles taking shelter in its interior.