We spent long hours heading SE waiting for the trades to come. The forecast was 24 hours out and the ground we could have made up was lost to us - c'est la vie.

Once the South-easterlies arrived we headed on a direct course for Salvador hoping that the daily skeds (the emails from race office giving us the positions of the other yachts) would show the lead boats slowing and/or tacking out towards us.

It was, unfotunately, not to be and though we gained some excellent ground on the other boats, we could only make 4th place into Salvador coming in some 80 miles (I think) ahead of Hull & Humber.

Well done to all in the race and well done to Durban, Nova Scotia & Glasgow who finished 1st, 2nd and 3rd respectively.

We crossed the equator at 0657 hours today - another milestone on the way to Salvador.

Received another weather (grib) file and decided that we had a cunning plan...

We were in a Southerly wind and the four leading boats had headed SW towards Brazil and looked to be going into slower winds (slower in terms of point of sail, proximity to the coast, etc.).

Our plan was to head SE (yeah I know it's the wrong way) and then pick up the south easterly trade winds which would give us a faster point of sail.

If luck was with us and the lead boats had to tack away from the coast we could make up huge amounts of mileage on them.

I've read quite a few books about yachts sailing through the doldrums and thought I had a fairly good idea of what to expect. Wrong!

Short, sharp squalls, hours of no wind and the resultant frustration at being parked were on the cards, guess again!

Okay, there were a couple of occasions when we didn't go very fast but the squalls were slightly different; especially the 36-hour one! We couldn't get out or through it! It just followed us Had fairly good winds though

We stayed in 5th place through the doldrums and headed down towards the equator.

Once the wind picked up we left the Canaries at the back of the fleet, 10th place and, unusually but not surprisingly, not one happy, smiling face on the Liverpool'08

However, those of us in the know , knew we wouldn't be here for long and we slowly picked up positions over the coming days and the smiles slowly returned.

Heading into the Cape Verdes islands we were in fifth place with Durban, Nova Scotia, Hull & Humber and Glasgow in front of us.

Endless hours looking at the weather forecasts saw us, and the majority of the fleet, heading into the Canaries (believe me, it was showing the strongest wind).

Only three boats stayed out (Durban, Singapore and Jamaica) and the rest of us raced to a standstill!

Bugger-all wind and nothing we can do about it! 36-hours of zilch! As well, make the best of it:

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Life goes on:

Once we received updated weather information for the Spanish and Portuguese coasts we headed out towards Madeira to hopefully get stronger winds to help take us quickly South.

We couldn't get as near to Madeira as we wanted and, 50 miles East of the islands, with Glasgow and Singapore close beihnd us we lost streerage at 3 am. (Glasgow later told us that they could see our red, green then white navigation lights as we pirouetted gracefully in the Atlantic!)

Once we had worked out that our rudder was jammed there was nothing else to do but go down and sort it out. Strangely enough, there were no volunteers so up steps yours truly, dons snorkelling gear and a safety line and in you go Crowley!

Fortunately, it was a clearish night and I could see that a fishing net had entangled itself in our rudder (no fish tho' ). On with the pony bottle and regs and, with the aid of my trusty knife, 5 minutes later, the rudder was clear.

A pat on the back, a dry towel, a cup of coffee and then race on... Oh yeah, and a medal

(Dave got his 'water boy' medal for fixing the watermaker on board - the bloke is a genius!)

A glorious afternoon in France and we all headed off to the start point outside La Rochelle for the 1400 start.

An exciting start saw us near the front as we headed out into the Bay of Biscay.

As usual, the fleet quickly dispersed and we headed westerly to get over the continental shelf and into deep water before the almost inevitable bad weather hit.

3 am saw us changing down from Yankee 1 to Yankee 2 and then to Yankee 3 and having fun on the foredeck. Being thrown 10 feet into the air as the boat slammed, close-hauled into a Force 8, all 5 of the foredeck crew (myself included )experienced the automatic inflation of our lifekjacket as tons of water crashed over the decks - ah, the pleasures of Biscay!

Just before we exited Biscay and rounded Cape Finisterre we saw one of the other boats who takced and passed passed our stern: