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DAY 8 – Isle of Palms to Myrtle Beach

Last night was a late night with boat work – navigation and race preparation was done this morning. So - program the GPS – study the charts – ask questions to those competitors that have done it before. We identify 3 obstacles – some breakers about 3 miles away, Cape Romain and then later a submerged jetty/breakwater.

There is a dark cloud looming in the south – which is sucking up all the wind and threatening rain. There is no wind – the sea is glassy. We line up paddles at the ready. Again I am sweating with anticipation. The gun goes and Fernando is doing such a great job pushing us out through the surf that the boat runs away from me – not to me mention me also stumbling in a hole at the same time! I manage to get on board ok – Beto is paddling hard. Soon we punch through the last line of waves. After that all the excitement is gone and we all flop around – panting – but not going anywhere. It takes us close to 3 hours to get 3 miles and we manage to avoid the first set of breakers on a nearby point and take the lead.

The breeze starts to fill in from the south east – maybe 5 knots worth. The sea is flat and green. We hold a line out to sea and the rest put up their spinnakers. Later is seems to paying so we put up ours too. So starts an 18 mile double trapeze spinnaker reach. We hang in with Tybee. Let me tell you 18 miles is a long way to hang on to a spinnaker!

We pass Cape Romain without ado. There are lots of sandbanks and breakers – but we find a gap and take an inside line while Tybee takes an outside line. We make some small gains. It is another 18 mile stretch to our submerged jetty - when we get there we are still on double trapeze. Tybee has pulled ahead. Our passage is made more pleasant by the occasional turtle, dolphin, manta ray or shark.

After clearing the jetty we have a 25 mile section down to Myrtle Beach. We free up and single trapeze all the way – the pale blue spinnaker pulling us along nicely in the setting sun. We hit the beach at around 18h00 – it’s been along day. Our ground crew and smiling faces are there to meet us. Beto and I head straight for the hot tub and relax until our hands are wrinkly.

Oh - before I forget - we finished second today, behind Tybee (again) and put some time on the guys that beat us yesterday.

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