Jason Fox, blog day 14:
So, I will start this with the obligatory weather check. Winds died in the night and we rowed (shocker), the sun rose and stayed with us all day. Winds have been a little tricky and are intent on keeping us close to Africa! We have contingency plans so fear not! I will also take this opportunity to say a huge thanks to Silver Fox aka my Dad! He is our 24hr on call weather guru and passage master! Thanks Dad!
Right, now for how this is going to be laid out. I am going to talk about a few things that mean a lot to us rogues. They are in no particular order but will comprise of the following chapters:
1. Mother Nature
2. The Boat
3. Creature Comforts
4. Food
5. Spooning
6. Music
7. Loved ones
8. You awesome lot
9. Why????
1. Mother Nature
I shall firstly talk about one of MN’s hardy enforcers The Atlantic Ocean! Now I know that one of us has already mentioned she is a cruel mistress. This she is and she will not allow you to go getting above your station! She will whip you into shape (I have come to learn this over the years but more so recently). I now also believe she is a violent drunk and we as a team have gotten ourselves into a rut. Every time the chips are down and we come through we break open the modest stash of rum to warm our insides. With this we splash a measure into the sea to keep her sweet! Doesn’t work! She takes it and whoops our behinds a little later in a drunken frenzy. Not sure how we get ourselves out of this as it is now a tradition on board to dish out the booze. Don’t want to see her with a hang over!!
Mother Nature has also given us much pleasure in many forms. These range from wildlife (turtles, Orca’s, Dolphins, suspected shark and lots of birds: gannets, terns, etc.) We have also seen some amazing sunrises and sunsets. MN has also given us starry nights which are amazing but what really occupies us are the cloud formations (when not grey!!), we have seen clouds that resemble stuff we can talk about (Eagles, elephants, people, faces, etc.), and things we can’t talk about!!
I will end this chapter on a quick question to the formidable Mother Nature:
Why, at forty miles from the West Saharan coast, are we freezing and wrapped up in full Musto MPX?
2. The Boat
Wow Ellida!!! The Rannoch built vessel. She is a Legend! Our confidence in her and hers in us has grown ten fold. She is a work horse, a machine (albeit manpowered) and lifesaver. She might be small and have to put up with 5 hefty rogues but she does it gracefully! Her only weak link is us unruly bunch. She keeps fighting our corner and does what is asked of her. I will hold a special place in my heart for her. Period!
3. Creature Comforts
Hahaha! What the hell are they?? Well we all have some. Guys have their phones and tablets loaded with literature but not an awful lot of time for that. A big one for me and I know the others are wet wipes. It’s very refreshing to have a good old wet wipe wash around the bits that need it. This, followed by a bit of Sudocream! Bliss. We also have the Explorer 510 which is our wifi terminal that we communicate back with. All curtesy of the kind geniuses at Inmarsat Global!! Other than that it’s warm tops, hats and gloves to stop the blisters!
4. Food
As you know we have copious amounts of Cadbury’s Dairy Milk, Wine Gums, Jelly Babies, M&M’s, protein bars, pork scratchings and Gavin’s Biltong. However our breakfast, main meals and puddings have thus far been wet rations. That’s boil in the bags for those in the know and it consists of food ready to go in bags that need boiling! Obvs!! We have beef casava, varying curry, all day breakfast and chocolate pudding. All not to bad. We had to plough through these first as they are heavy and we need to ditch weight so we can increase our speed. Yesterday we moved on to our freeze dried rations that need rehydrating with water. These are made by Mountain House and OMG these things are the most amazing expedition rations I have tasted!! Unbelievable. Get yourself to an outdoor shop, ignore the price and try one!! Favourites so far are oatmeal with raspberries, chicken korma and sweet and sour chicken!!
5. Spooning
It was cold, he is cute and besides we are ex Bootnecks, it’s normal.
Ooh, whilst here I will touch on the water through the hatch incident. This is an entire story in itself by the way! Now looking back on our lives Aldo and I can’t ever recall screaming like teenage fans at a 1D concert. We did then! 20 litres of ice cold Atlantic Ocean at 3am does that.
6. Music
Now this will be short and I will no doubt embarrass myself! We don’t listen to music when Mother Nature has her enforcer kicking our now scrawny behinds!! We do listen to it after said moments when in need of morale and also during good weather. There have been no arguments over music as yet and it ranges from house music and Bloc Party (mine), Nick Mulvey (Mats), Stereophonics, Bruce Hornsby (both Ollies), The Killers (Ross’s) and Kylie Minogue, Carly Simon (mine )!! Aldo lost all his prior to departure thank goodness!!
7. Loved Ones
I cannot do a blog with out mentioning the above!! Anyway you all know who you are to us. You are our emotional support and you do more and mean more to us than you can possibly imagine!! Just by knowing you are there, watching, praying and wishing for us is the most amazing feeling! Remember we all look at the same stars regardless of where we are!
8. You Awesome Lot
Social media, the Internet!! You guys are, as titled above, awesome. Your love, support, donations and kind words really are our driving mechanism. I reflect back to pushing out the wish list and being mesmerised by the rally for support and the generosity that was the fall out from it!! However it began long before then as we all know. The continued following and positive vibes are truly inspiring. Thank you so much one and all!!!x
9. Why?
We each have our reasons and I will talk about mine. Because of my life I have always needed to push myself physically and mentally. Now, I went through a sticky patch as a few of you know. During that period I lost focus and didn’t push myself in those ways, it nearly was the end for me. A little over 18 months ago Mat asked me onboard (see what I did there?) and he literally saved my life by doing so. There have of course been many other things that I have to keep me focused and excited, some are obvious, but this was and remains the catalyst! So, hopefully, with that in mind I can be an example to those who feel they have lost their way and self belief. You can regain it and go on to do anything.
Also, on my travels during my old career I have bore witness to many horrid things children have to endure both physically and mentally. This coupled with having children myself and wanting them to retain their innocence for as long as practically possible, I felt the NSPCC was an appropriate choice. Also, my mum was heavily involved with them back in the day so made sense really.
Finally Team Essence! Aldo Kane, Oliver Bailey, Mat Bennett and Ross Johnson. Wouldn’t do it with anyone else! Ask me that at the end!
I must now bring this days blog to an end as my shift is nearly upon me and I upon my extremely sore, scrawny backside. I hope you enjoyed it and that it’s given you a little insight into what’s going on out here! Catch you all soon and thanks!!
Foxy smile emoticon xxx