Two long days of safety work; sailing out in the ocean beyond the “heads”, and seemingly endless chores to get the boat in full racing condition, and we’re on track. The sailing community is giving us plenty of full on Australian humour, returned in kind.

Today’s practice had us doing spinnaker work under the Harbor Bridge, and tacking along by the Opera House – all a bit surreal.

Crew dinner at Bondi Beach tonight, and then two more days of inspections, tuning up, and loading the provisions. Our fearless leader Joe is giving a speech at the yacht club tonight – we all feel fortunate to be somewhere else (oh the crew have just corrected me – bitterly disappointed apparently).