Liverpool Start

It is now Friday afternoon and we are almost ready for the start of the race. I have been enjoying my last few luxuries and decided to stay in a hotel in Albert Dock. This is a photo from my room of the boats tied up to the pontoon - Durban is very colorful with plenty of South African flags strung from the forestays.



Tonight is the "Legendary" Crew Party (I am intrigued to find out why they call it legendary) and then tomorrow is mostly an off day - I may find a quiet little pub somewhere in Liverpool.

On Sunday we start slipping our berths at 11am and then need to make our way through a series of locks to get to the Mersey River in time for the start at 3pm. We are expecting some fairly strong winds so it should be an exciting race to La Rochelle in France - expected to only take 3 to 4 days. We then leave La Rochelle on Sunday the 23rd for a much longer haul to Salvador in Brazil.

Clipper announced today that Santa Cruz is going to be the North American stopover with the fleet arriving around the 6th of April. This is only about 100 miles south of Walnut Creek so expect to be spending a good part of the 10 days sleeping in my own bed. Unfortunately our new house is expected to be finished at the end of March so as much as I tried to avoid the move I may be spending the 10 days moving furniture. [I intend to send a separate email to our Contractor that any delays are ok]

Hopefully I will be able to post another blog from La Rochelle.