Kraken Craic

It’s nearly 4pm and a week after my trip to Malta. At 4pm, it’s time for my watch to get 4 hrs sleep before first night watch, and I seem still to want that siesta!

I’ve only just stopped dreaming about the boat, and swaying from side to side as I walk. It was a really good trip. Mainly decent wind, and not too much to be unnerving. The boat sails really well, and glides along at 10-12 knots without any effort. A couple of times, there was a squall, and the boat leapt into action and doubled in speed. Then we saw what it would be capable of in an offshore race.

The boat is made from carbon fibre, rigged with dyneema so everything is designed to weigh as little as possible. There are few creature comforts.

The hull frame has several sealable compartments so that if one part of the boat is damaged, water should not spread to the others. Some of these barriers are open at sea and some closed. I tried not to think of the Titanic.

There were 15 of us on board Telefonica Black, AKA Kraken.

Skipper Lance is a round the world sailor and owns the boat with his partner Claire who is mainly shore-based.

First Mate Mary apart from being an ace sailor holds three world records for rowing across the Atlantic and the Pacific!

Watch Leader Alex is also a round the world sailor and is planning a single handed challenge in the next Mini Transat race in tiny 21’ yachts.

And Watch Leader Verity is both a seasoned sailor and a ski instructor.

The rest of the crew were us rookies from Lough Swilly and one lone Englishman, Robin, who was definitely outnumbered.

The boat is kitted out for major race events, and the passage to Malta was to position the boat for the Rolex Inner Sea Race later in October. Most of the crew then are Volvo Ocean race veterans.

But we are not, and great care was taken to explain each and every manoeuvre, ensure they were carried out slowly and safely, and not to have too much sail up for the conditions of both weather and crew.

On board facilities sound grim but were in fact quite comfortable. We slept in canvas pipe cot beds, four hours at a time, then swapped bed with the other watch.

The only cooking facilities were a single calor gas stove and a big kettle, kept busy making hot drinks and food. There were unlimited snacks, porridge pots, fruit, and expedition packs of freeze dried meals – add hot water and wait. These were actually unexpectedly tasty.

The ‘heads’ were a gimballed carbon fibre toilet just in front of the mast, and if the compartment door on one side was shut it was a signal that the throne was occupied.

The only water supply on board was from a salt water and a fresh water hand pump. So water for the WC was poured in from a scoop and pumped out by hand. But this was luxury compared to the bucket by the poop deck that I’d almost expected.

It was fascinating to get to grips with what was similar to any sailing boat, and what was very different – mainly around the linked grinders used for up to 6 people to turn the huge winches the size of oil drums, and the huge tonnes of load on every rope, noting the eye watering cost of any slip that could cause damage, not to mention crew injury

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Rather amazing, the 5 metre keel cants, it can be swung to the windward side, by an angle of up to 40 degrees. And because it likes to sail on its chines, most of the hull is out of the water. To counteract a lot of leeway, sideways movement, there are two hydraulic dagger boards on deck which are raised and lowered as required to help keep the boat on track.

My favourite memory is helming the boat in the darkness, navigating by starlight, feeling the wind changing and adjusting my course, and feeling the power of this racing thoroughbred (more on a trot than a gallop). That was worth the deprivations!

In the end, we ran out of wind and had to motor slowly towards Valletta for several hours.

We arrived into the stunning harbour just before dawn.

It was only a few hours until our flights, but we had time for a dawn swim after several days at sea, a delicious breakfast ashore, and a mad dash to the airport!