Howzit, Bru?

Durban October 21st 2006

“Man it's hot. It's like Africa hot. Tarzan couldn't take this kind of hot.” – Eugene Morris Jerome (Matthew Broderick), Biloxi Blues

And wet. We are coming into the African summer, which also happens to be its rainy season. So moisture-laden cold fronts dump their loads all over us, and then follow up with another scorching and humid day.

I have a festering cough and sniffle, but I can’t blame that on African weather. My beloved brother, Typhoid Pete, passed on his cold as a winter gift from the disgruntled patients of St Georges Hospital, Tooting, who begrudge me my sunny sailing holiday in Durban. Bastards.

I was starting to feel a teensy bit aggrieved at spending too much time getting rained on and coughing up phlegm (all of which I could do in Derry). But then I spent two hours in a sailing boat and saw a flock of pelicans, some reed cormorants, a humpback whale, two pods of dolphins and a school of hammerhead sharks (none of which are particularly common in Derry).

So it’s all good, and it will be better when the antibodies kick the backside of this lurgy.

I’m ensconced in the hallowed halls of Professional Yachtmaster Training, which is mentioned in sailing circles in the same hushed tones as academics would employ when talking about, say, All Souls College, Oxford. It is powerhouse of nautical prowess, turning out yacht skippers the way Harvard Business School turns out chief executives.

Yeah, and getting me to write that crap just cost them their annual PR budget (roughly the cost of a beer).

Actually, they are pretty good. The main reason I am here is that Colin Schwegman, one of their leading lights, was my first sailing instructor, and we have kept in touch over the years. He and his colleagues don’t normally offer the RYA yachtmaster qualification that I need, but they have just got permission to do so. I’m the lab rat for their first efforts.

However, there is a wee complication. In order to fulfil the requirements of the RYA syllabus, I will have to go up to Maputo in Mozambique, where the sailing conditions are deemed to be sufficiently demanding.

Sailing here in Durban is pretty tough and needs a lot of attention to the basics of good seamanship, just to stay afloat. However, one feature of coastal navigation is not present here – tidal streams. Not tide per se, just the currents that arise when you try to squeeze a tide into somewhere like the Solent. These are pretty important, as any poor sod who has tried to struggle out past the Needles at the wrong time can attest.

But oddly enough, Durban and most of South Africa are basically free of them. Lord knows they’ve got most other navigational ball-breakers.

There is plenty of wind. You don’t get bragging rights in Point Yacht Club unless you’ve beaten into a 60-knot storm in an Optimist, as far as I can tell. So I sip my pint quietly. Maybe they just bullshit better here.

The swell coming from the Indian and Southern Oceans has nothing to stop it until it hits the southern breakwater at the harbour mouth, so a moderate Force 4 brings with it a respectable crop of belligerent rollers. A year ago, I viewed them from the lofty heights of a Clipper 68. These days, I am sailing out in a little L34, the deck of which is a lot closer to the action.

As if the natural hazards weren’t enough, the Saffers have added some artificial ones. There is also an awful lot of heavy traffic in and out of Durban harbour. Sharing the channel with some grotesquely huge car-carrier is not to be recommended.

Generally speaking, it’s a great place to be reminded that the sea is bigger and badder than we are.

But it’s fun. The South African coast is an exciting place to sail. It pretty nearly wiped me out last year (check out my blog entry from 19th November 2005 for a reminder). However, I think I am made of sterner stuff now.

Nonetheless, the tidal work has to be done and this is not the place to do it. So in two weeks’ time I head north with Colin’s brother, Neil, and we will yachtmasterize in the currents and eddies of Mozambique, while surveying the area for future courses. Suits me fine. I’m all for more sailing in weird and exotic locations.

I spent the week in the company of Andrew, Graham and Rob in their final week of preparation for their (IYT) yachtmaster exams. Andrew and Graham are a father and son combo from Durban. Oddly, it’s young Graham who is already a pro sailor working in the Med, and was just upgrading his qualifications. Dad is hoping to follow in his son’s footsteps, and is heading out to the Caribbean to work on charter boats. Rob is a cheerful Aussie lad straight from central casting. He’s also working on Med superyachts. They were all good chaps to work with. And they all passed, so congrats all round.

The instructor, Shaun, is one of the stalwarts of PYT, and teaches with the same clear, methodical ease that his colleagues do.

The main difficulty was relearning the language. You may believe that Durban is an English-speaking area of South Africa. But then someone says something like, “Howzit bru? Hey, lekker! Looks like you okes have it waxed!” You do wonder.

Durbs holds some very happy memories for me. As I said, I started to sail here. More recently, the mouth of Durban harbour marked the end of leg two of the Clipper race, and the spectacular start of leg three. Gratifyingly, people here are still talking about that day. It seems a good time was had by all. They must have liked it. They’ve signed for more next year.

Next week for me is likely to be classroom based. I will be learning the black art of celestial navigation. Once upon a time, in a university far, far away, I was OK at maths and physics, so I hope it shouldn’t be too hard. A lot of cerebral degradation has happened since then, though.

I’m quite looking forward to some structured learning again. I learned a lot by osmosis while on the race, but it will be good to shore all that up with some more rigorous study.

If I can remove the pounds I put on since I got back from the race, that will be even better.

Wot I Done in my Holidayz

The holidays are nearly over: even Parliament will be back at work in a month or so. Therefore it is time for the compulsory account of what I have been doing for the past few weeks.

The short answer is "a lot, and not enough". The list reads reasonably well: visiting family in Ireland, sailing to Cardiff and back on my favourite Clipper, Swanning around Sardinia lusting after superyachts, pottering about the lakes and islands of western Sweden, and tramping around some rather damp hills in Wales. And, amazingly, I am a pro. I'm getting paid to sail these days.

All of these activities were very fine. The problem has been the gaps in between them, which have been characterised by restlessness, uncertainty, lack of physical activity and the unwelcome return of the beer-gut.

But first, the good stuff...

Rather importantly, I've been back to Ireland to see the family. I had a great reception in Liverpool with a bus load of them showing up to cheer me in. I rather rudely then jumped right back on the boat and sailed away again to deliver the boat back to Gosport (via Howth). They deserved a little better than that, so it was not a hard decision to head back over to Ireland for a week to say hello. My nieces Ellen and Niamh (who are both training to be opera divas) kept me entertained.

I also caught up with Ian Jeffers and Jonny Carson, two of the Ulster lads from the crew, who are now back living in Belfast. Also in Belfast are two very good friends, Peter and Hannah, who are both molecular biologists. It turns out they have been doing a little genetic engineering in their leisure hours, the results of which are due next March. I expect the outcome will be some sort of superhuman uber-being representing the next level in our evolution. Oh well, as long as he or she is as nice as his chromosome donors, all will be well.

By the time I left Ireland, I was already getting quite twitchy to get back on a boat. Thankfully it was already planned to take Cardiff (the boat) to Cardiff (the city) so that the good people of South Wales could get to a look at her. It would have been nice to take the whole crew around, but in the end only a handful of us made it. Most were working on restarting jobs and careers left behind over a year previously.

Among the absentees was Conor, our skipper. He had to head off to Romania to be with his family and start searching for work. His replacement was Simon Bradley, an affable former crewmember of Bristol Clipper, winners of the 2000 race. He is now a Yachtmaster Instructor and delivery skipper. As well as being great company, he was an excellent teacher of sailing skills and practice. To round off the crew, we had a bunch of candidates for the 07/08 race, who fitted in as if they had been with us all the way.

The sailing wasn't fantastic - we were forced to rely on the engine for a fair part of the way - but it was therapeutic to be back on board. On the whole, though, our stay in Cardiff beat the actual journey. We were there as part of the Harbour Festival. The Harbour Authority treated us like royalty during our stay. We were wined and dined most evenings, meeting the Lord Mayor and the various groups associated with our sponsorship.

There was work, too. The boat was open to the public over the Bank Holiday weekend and we guided over 2000 people around her. In the mornings we went for short sails with assigned groups. One day was given to the winners of a radio competition. I think they enjoyed themselves .In general, the interest and enthusiasm expressed by everyone was overwhelming. I only wish we had done better for them in the race.

We were pretty exhausted when we set sail for Gosport again, and a Force 7 wind over the second biggest tidal stream in the world didn't help. Simon very kindly (or perhaps, shrewdly) had offered to let me do the passage as a Yachtmaster qualifier - so I made the navigational decisions while he, er, got lots of sleep. Actually, he was a very useful instructor and I learned a lot. I'm just glad it wasn't my exam.

We broke the journey in Fowey in Cornwall for a pleasant evening before the last run up the Channel and the Solent. All in all, a lot of fun.

The best thing about it (well, almost) was that I GOT PAID. I was officially Mate on the boat, and I have the prospect of more work with Clipper after my Yachtmaster. So, another fifty or so gigs like that and I will just about break even.

The other sailing experience of the post-Clipper summer was in Sardinia. I helped out on the Sparkman & Stephens Swan 57 Yellowdrama, taking part in the Swan Cup in Porto Cervo. This, it has to be said, was a very different kind of yachting to what I have been doing for the last year or so. No damp pipe bunks, no weeks of 24-hour watch systems, no tinned ham. This is what the luxury end of the business is all about.

Yellowdrama itself is a lovely boat (as Swans tend to be), but at a mere 57 feet long, she was at the compact end of the Sardinian yachting spectrum. As well as the Swan Cup, yacht groupies could also swoon over the Perini Navi Cup and the Rolex Maxi Cup. Perini Navi is an Italian yard which only builds 'em huge and luxurious. Among the lustable boats on show was Maltese Falcon, a modern three-masted square-rigger registering a humungous 286 feet long.

The Maxi Cup was sort of a Formula 1 Grand Prix of every sexy racing yacht on the planet. If you are into droolng over your copy of Yachting World every month you will recognize their names: Maximus, Wild Oats, ABN Amro I, Velsheda - they were all there. It was the most extravagant display of yachting bling I've ever seen.

It did seriously set me thinking about my career. Not about sailing, I'd never get to be crew on one of those boats. No, more about how I'm going to make enough money to buy one. Even going back to the City probably wouldn't be enough. I'm probably going to have to get into something decently high-margin, like people-trafficking, or bulk credit-card fraud, or crack smuggling.

In a way, it was a relief to come home. Having an inferiority complex because my net worth is less than nine figures was becoming depressing.

My other foreign adventure of the summer was different, but no less fun. Arne Dimblad is a Swedish gent I met in the Philippines during our enforced stopover there. He keeps a yacht in Puerto Galera, which I helped him sail down around Busuanga in the Calamian Group. He very kindly invited me to visit him in Sweden, and I was happy to accept.

Now, if you go to visit someone in Sweden, you might hope that they live in a picturesque timber house, in a quiet forest by an idyllic lake. Thankfully, Arne feels exactly the same way, and that is exactly what his house (located near Alingsas, east of Gothenburg) is like. I was put up in fine style in "The Captain's Cabin", my own little villa in the grounds. A short walk took me to the water's edge, or deeper into the damp, autumn forest. It was just perfect.

We spent the days in the forest picking mushrooms, or on the lake sailing a dinghy. We took one day to visit Orust, an island on the west coast and the home to Sweden's yachting industry. The yards for Hallberg-Rassy and Naiad yachts are there, among others, and we spent a happy yacht-nerd day nosing around them (and the tall ship at Lyseskil).

Throughout, I had the excellent company of three formidable ladies: Arne's wife Didi, his daughter-in-law Isabel and granddaughter Klara. As well as looking after me fantastically well, Didi and Isabel did sterling work as my personal shopping advisors in Gothenburg at present-buying time.

And that was nearly it. There was a little more paid sailing for Clipper (a day's corporate entertainment in the Solent) and some yomping around Welsh hills. But basically, I find myself now visiting the folks for a quick goodbye before South Africa and the rigours of an Ocean Yachtmaster course.

And very welcome they will be. I need work, and something to use up some strength and brain power. The relaxation phase is over and I am restless. I have managed to do some DIY around my flat, but that is every bit as boring as it sounds and I need to get away and do something meaningful.

And I need to figure out some sort of formula for life that will allow me to settle into something. Hopefully the waters around South Africa will afford some sort of opportunity for that.

The Beginning Stages Of...

In the beginning, there was The Shipping Blues. And it was good. But now cometh Windward, a new blog that reflects a new chapter and is hopefully a little more thoughtfully maintained, both by me and the site administrators

The Shipping Blues (check it out at http://www.20six.co.uk/joemulvey) was my diary of the 2005-06 Clipper Round The World Yacht Race. It was originally intended just as a tool for keeping a small group of family and friends in touch with my oceanic blunderings. Somehow some other people got interested which was (and is) all to the good.

The race is now over, and life continues. For the small number of people around the world who are interested in my sailing and other adventures, I hope this diary will keep you informed about what I get up to in the next few months and years.

It's fair to say that I am not too sure what is in store myself. The immediate future holds a two month trip to South Africa to make use of all those sea miles and complete an Ocean Yachtmaster sailing course. Thereafter things are less certain. There are whispers of sailing in South East Asia and (less glamorously) in the English Channel. However before anything is set in stone I need to address myself to dealing with some basic questions. What am I going to do? Where am I going to do it? And so on.

None of which I intend to bore you with. In the the near term, I hope to supply the usual tragicomic litany of watery disasters that the readers of The Shipping Blues have come to expect. I promise to almost die in a stupid accident at least once every three weeks, and to sail in winds exceeding 40 knots at least once every 10 days. Should I fail to achieve these objectives I will, of course, make something up. I may occasionally throw in the odd nugget of genuine personal insight, but caring about it is strictly optional.

In the very near term, readers can expect a short update on Life after Clipper, and perhaps some choice photographs from the race and after.

Watch this cyberspace...