Blog from yacht Pendragon in the 1000 mile doublehanded race (Scheveningen (NL) - Bergen (NO) - Lerwick (Shetlands) - Bergen (NO). Starting June 16th 2011. Crew members: Jan Borgdorff (left) and Georges Kemmerling (right). Pendragon is a "Van de Stadt" 36 ft Excalibur from 1968. We are racing against modern yachts, but with an IRC rating which may help to even the score a bit.



donderdag 9 juni 2011

Countdown, one week to go

It's one week before the start and we feel ready! It has been a lot of hard work though. This race takes us over the North Sea and away from the coast. We can't duck into a port if we dont like the weather and we cant get immediate help is we have medical or technical problems. That is why we are racing under ISAF CAT2 rules. It is a long list of requirements that we will have to meet!

We have two hand pumps, wire cutters, lifelines and life-vests, an emergency rudder, an orange storm jib, life-raft, flares, EPIRB (SOS satellite buoy), grab bag and survival suits (see fotograph) and much more. Friday we will get a first aid course. In the mean time we had to repair our propeller shaft and our autopilot. Everyone pitched in though; Jan made a brilliant plexiglass (12 mm) hatch for the companionway, Nanny organised our foodsupplies and dehydrated meals and Yvette organized our on-board drugstore. We bought charts and pilots for the area and updated our electronic charts and finally we installed an Iridium satelite phone which we will use for e-mail and for receiving Ugrib windpredictions.

Saturday we will start in the Bruine Bank race which is our qualifier for the 1000 mile race.