On the ball, Lizzy!

Apologies for the lateness of the blog - we had weak internet signal in Lamlash Harbour last night.  More news this evening from Millport.

Today, the second day of our expedition was similar to yesterday as it was another rough day with a plethora of meals being thrown up by Maddie and Nadia. Our day began with a lovely breakfast of hash-browns and beans made by Abbie and Hannah, and then it was up on deck to start untying ourselves from the jetty at Campbeltown.


Our journey started optimistically with four hours of great helming from Millie at the wheel, but after a while many of us started to feel slightly rough, with Maddie starting to do the first vomiting of the day, shortly followed by Nadia. The winds weren’t necessarily stronger than yesterday, but a more open crossing meant some rougher seas as the waves had had chance to build up.

The journey was silent as Hannah- our lead singer- wasn’t feeling too good. Nadia took the helm over from Millie, but only managed 20 minutes before feeling too ill and Matt had to take control. Cath then came up and gave us all a hot bread roll at about 2pm- saving a few of us from starvation (Millie ate Lucy’s and Nadia’s too.)

Lucy intended to steer us to Plada Island for a late lunch stop, but on discussion with Colin, it was decided this would delay us far too heavily, so we stopped the boat in the middle of the sea; but only Lizzy, Lucy, Millie, Abbie managed it downstairs as the others were either throwing up in Bertie the Bucket or on the verge of doing so. Lunch was great though - leak and potato soup or chunky beef, but all this came to an end very quickly and we had to get back sailing.

We were all freezing, hungry and noses running in the afternoon; but we kept on fighting and took control of the boat well, Abbie took the helm and we continued our journey to Lamlash. Lucy had to go downstairs every 30 mins to put in a log entry and position fix on the chart - which she secretly enjoyed as she got about 45 mins warmth (even though it should only take about 10 mins!)

Abbie and Lizzy went downstairs to start on our delicious chicken pie tea at 4.30pm while the others were up on deck still sailing. A plethora of songs were sung and Hannah took over with the steering.

Millie, Lucy, Nadia and Hannah were the last on deck, sailing until 9.00pm before anchoring up off Holy Island in Lamlash Harbour, and were really scared when we saw ‘the woman in black’ on the island in front. We were exhausted and glad to come down into the warmth. We sat down to eat chicken pie (Lizzy made some lovely shapes out of the pastry) and Chocolate brownies with Nadia and Lucy’s chocolate on top. We learned over our chat at tea, how Lizzy had melted the plastic spatula in preparing the chicken, ‘On the Ball Lizzy!!!!’

We are all really tired and apologise if the blog is slightly drifty and boring, but were really weary and can’t wait for bed after a very long, hard day.

See you soon, can’t wait to step on dry land again....

Millie and Lucy

x


Read more about Sail Training on board Tenacity of Bolton at http://www.tenacityofbolton.org/