Raised to date:

£1,525,050.44

DAY 18 - JAMES KAYLL

Okay. Just a short one tonight I'm afraid. We are back in business and we are looking to get back on top of the mileage after our recent mishaps. Having recovered from the embarrassment of falling out of the boat on Thursday night I am now back in the role of navigating the team to a swift conclusion of the race (touch wood!).

General update

Thursday's capsize came as a shock to some of the guys but from my perspective I could see it coming. I had been chatting to Tony who runs our weather routing from the UK and had asked how long we could feasibly expect the conditions we had to continue. it was really rough.  It was getting to the point where it looked like we might have to batten down the hatches and wait for the storm to pass. In the end we chose to press on. With the autohelm problems and the manual steering routine at night I felt this was the best course. In the end we just go unlucky with a freak wave which came from a completely different direction to the rest. It caught us off guard and the next thing I knew I was practicing a new game called 'who dares swims'. Thankfully I was very strongly secured to the boat and able to get back in quite easily. 

We have a few technical challenges on board since the eskimo roll, but the key thing is that from a safety perspective everything is solid and working well. The only technical bit that continues to give us trouble is the autohelm but it has been performing better today so we live in hope. More frustratingly, our capacity to use our primary satphone and our media transmission kit (the fleet broadband system) is currently nil. We are working on a fix but it is not guaranteed so this is limiting some of the media and campaign coverage that we had hoped to secure. Please tweet, talk and help us drive the donations. 

And finally, thank you all for your support. We can feel the positive vibes out here and they make a massive difference - please keep them coming!

 

 

 

 

Latest Blog Posts

DAY 49 - CAYLE ROYCE'S FINISH LINE BLOG

After a frustrating last 24 hours or so we began today with slow conditions and not much visibility. It was quite squally, with little rain showers coming and going, but things cleared quite abruptly around 8am and suddenly we could see land. After being hidden in the mist it appeared out of nowhere and it seemed really close! This last stretch was totally different to the first half of the race. For so much of this crossing the weather has been horrific, I have never experienced anything like this. Yesterday morning at 8 am marked the first time in the entire race that we had a full 24 hours out of full foul weather gear and today is also the first day that an equipment failure would not be a cause for emotional devastation. I always thought that we would make it, but equipment failures could have slowed us down a lot. The thought of breakages always kept us on edge. But now we can finally enjoy the realisation that WE HAVE DONE IT!!!!!!!!

Read More | posted on Jan 21, 2014

DAY 48 – SCOTT BLANEY'S FINAL BLOG

It feels great to count down the hours and the miles. It is a big morale boost to know that we are almost there. For most of the crossing I had felt confident that we would make it but we did have a few scares. When the auto-helm broke I did worry that we would be down to one rower for the whole crossing. One rowing and one hand-steering would have been a horrible routine. Luckily we managed to fix it. But the most important bit of equipment is my leg - it has never let me down.

Read More | posted on Jan 20, 2014

DAY 47 – MARK JENKINS FINAL BLOG

Hard as it is to believe, this is my final blog! It has been a moment to reflect on an extraordinary 7 weeks at sea and an even more extraordinary group of people. By that I mean not just the guys in the boat, but the many wounded persons that they represent. I have been thinking a lot about what this team has achieved and what we hope others can achieve. This project has been about setting a huge challenge, committing wholeheartedly to it and then facing every challenge head on in pursuit of our goal. There have been no excuses only a choice to live this experience to its fullest and to take a positive attitude to all things. I hope that we have demonstrated that it is not what people see in you but what you go on to do that counts. I want to thank to all those who have personally supported me – you know who you are. There were a few people who said it could not be done. Oh dear… you will have to kiss my nappy-rash!

Read More | posted on Jan 19, 2014