No answer from Mirabaud!
09:00: nothing.
09:15: nothing.
I waited 15 minutes and tried again as pre-arranged. Dominique’s voice came through loud and clear. “I thought it was you. Sorry, we were just doing something up on deck.”
The north-westerly has dropped and the Mirabaud duo is waiting for the next low pressure to hit. In the meantime, they are wrestling with lumpy seas and very little wind.
“Right now we have the genoa up, but later on tonight, once we get into the low pressure, the wind will go through the entire range and we will be using every sail we have. Fun and games!”
Dominique is in his element and in good humour despite a difficult night. “It wasn’t easy last night,” he said. “We had one squall after another and they were very difficult to read. In some we had 35 knots, in others no wind at all. They were tricky to plan for in terms of having the right sail up.”
