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Calypso - Mission Accomplished



Calypso and her crew finally crossed the finish line at St Lucia on Tuesday
17 December 2013 at 1553 local time, 23 days 6 hours, 53 minutes and 40
seconds after departing Las Palmas in the Canary Islands. The "corrected
time" according to the organisers and after taking into account motoring and
the yacht's handicap, was about 25 days. The yellow brick tracker showed
that we had sailed 3037 nautical miles and our log showed 3038 miles. It
appears that we were 14th in or class but, as we weren't racing, were not
disappointed with the result - just pleased to have arrived safely!

The journey from Guernsey was done in stages:
1. Guernsey, Northern France, Bay of Biscay, cruising Galicia (Northern
Spain) and down to Povoa de Varzim in Northern Portugal. 685 miles.
2. Cruising down the Portuguese coast with several stops to Lisbon. 193
miles.
3. Lisbon, Porto Santo, Madeira and on to Gran Canaria. 778 miles.
4. Las Palmas (Gran Canaria) to Rodney Bay in St Lucia. 3084 miles.
Since departing Guernsey on 24 June, Calypso has logged 4694 miles!

The crossing itself was not the easy "milk run" as some people refer to
it--we had to cope with calms, thunderstorms and a number of days of strong
winds and rough seas, but we arrived safely in St Lucia having had no
significant problems. We are now safely moored in Rodney Bay marina.

Preparing the boat for the ARC has been hard work, time consuming and
expensive but it has paid off and at no time on the crossing were we
concerned with Calypso's seaworthiness. She is a really great yacht and I'd
recommend a Hallberg-Rassy to anyone contemplating offshore sailing.

The crew were all great and really pulled their weight. All did their
watches as required. Dino was fantastic with his cooking, sailing skills and
sheer enthusiasm. Phil would happily go forward and attend to matters on the
deck in rough conditions, he also wrote most of the blogs, was our 'medic',
and prepared a number of meals. John worked flat out to keep the sails
trimmed, updating the log, plotting our positions and dealing with
mechanical issues. He also kept us entertained with his yarns and jokes.

The crew made it easy for me and I am extremely grateful to all three, and,
more importantly we remain good friends!!

To Dino, John and Phil…A big "Thank You"

It just remains for me to swan around the Caribbean for a while!!!

David


ARC 020 (800x600)

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