A biltong crime and some full on days ahead

Hamish Hooper blogs from on board CAMPER….

As we were sitting on the stack sailing along last night a couple of the guys thanked me for making a good dinner. As it turned out they both were surprised to hear it was something completely different to what I had cooked, Adam thought it was Honey Soy Chicken, Animal thought it was Beef Teriyaki- I had cooked a Lamb Stir fry.

I guess this shows how good a cook I am.

While on the topic of food, there has been a bit of unrest emerging again amongst the guys with the unspeakable happening- people have been missing out of their daily ration of biltong. This can only mean one thing- someone is stockpiling.

I have my suspicions but am not one to point fingers without having some concrete evidence so I can come down on them with an iron fist. I am subtly investigating, but the fact there is so much unrest about it from everyone I think the culprit has ceased criminal activity- at least for now.

I am considering installing 24-hour video surveillance around the food bags.

Life onboard is a mixed bag, it’s becoming more comfortable with the temperature dropping, but on the flip side is now becoming less comfortable with the increasing sea swell. Cooking and cleaning in the galley is once again becoming like riding a bucking bronco standing up.

I have a sense that the last 4 days of this legs are going to be rather full on.

There is big discussion in the nav station about our final route to Sanya. Until a couple of hours ago it looked like most of the fleet were going to take the coastal route, sailing north to close to the Mekong River mouth before tucking into the Vietnam coast and short tacking up there to minimize the effect of the current. Since then it seems Puma has tacked away and opted for a more easterly route, also Telefonica has tacked away, either to come across to our line or also take the easterly route away from the coast.

These seemingly late changes in tack may have something to do with the weather, which is looking pretty rough, windy and unpleasant with one local Chinese weather model forecasting up to 48 knots. One line of thinking is it could be too heinous for the fishermen to be out, so less fishing nets to avoid, I don’t really see much comfort in this thought other than it possibly presents a small sniff of opportunity for us on CAMPER.

Here’s a fact for you:

The Mekong River is 2800 miles long and begins in the mountains of Tibet and flows through China, Burma, Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam before emptying into the South China Sea.
That’s a big river.
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GOLDEN QUOTE: “It’s getting pretty interesting now as the fleet start tacking up the South China Sea, again the question- East or West, which is best?
We expect the fishing fleet of Vietnam to be as numerous as in the Straits of Malacca but the reality is we know far less about this coastline. No body sails there because it’s too rough, that is except for the Volvo Ocean Race.” WILL OXLEY