Its insanely bouncy on board at the moment, excuse me as the keyboard clatters away on its own!

Unlike our mystery mark rounding at the eastern end of the previous gate when we had calm seas and bucolic sunshine, this time it was all action. Afrter days of very shifty conditions after our gybe at 48 south, we had finally settled into relatively stable tight reaching conditions, switching between solent and staysail jibs with reefs to match.

On approach to the western end of the Auzzie security gate we were hard on the wind for the final few miles and this just served heighten the drama of our bear away. We did a tight rounding to look for the inflateable Kangaroo that Campbell had talkded about but didn’t see anything of note in the windswept seas. We did a hard turn onto an easterly course and doubled our speed in an instant. You’ll see in the photo of Sam that our sail change from staysail to solent was pretty sporty, particularly when we caught a wave an surfed at 21 kts as the sail was coming down!

Since turning right we’ve been back to having bricks of water thrown at our heads and outdoor fashion has reverted back to the full sailor’s “burkha” with only the eyes showing. On my Gill Ocean Smock I can even close this gap by ducking my head inside my collar, leaving me impervious to the spray but blind in the bargain! Eventually I gave up on driving and passed the helm to Knut and ducked for cover. We’ve since averaged 16kts with surfs to 22 on the back of waves and as the wind builds we’ll have to come up with some clever ways to slow the boat down!

Down below we are at least dry, but life inside is far from calm and restful. Even sitting is a work out as one constantly braces against the wild motion. Some how I don’t thinik we’ll see the Southern Ocean Ab Master 40 in any infomercials anytiime soon. “Do you want to smell bad, eat crap food but get abs to diei for? Buy the Southern Ocean Ab Master Express 40 NOW, for only three easy payments of 200,000 euros. Call now and we’ll give you a race around the world for free. Thats right, and the first lucky caller gets sea sick pills on us!

Blue fingers, grey sea, grey skies, a flash of light every 3 hours. Such is our routine for the moment.
We gybed within the same 3 hour sched as the Fields and have now been drag racing north east towards the western corner of the Australian security gate. The uninspiring colour scheme of our lives has been livened up by the psychotic wind that is as fickle as a teething baby.

We can been sailing quite happily under big spinnaker in 20 knots when a gust of 28 knots blows hard for a few seconds, just long enough to wipe the boat out before dropping away to 15kts instantly, with an innocent look on its cherubic face. As such, Sam and I have been kept on our toes changing between our big runner kite, to the reacher, down to the little reaching gennaker, back to the big runner and so on and so on. At least it serves to keep the blood flowing through digits that would die and fall off if left unattended.

That said, we should be thankful for our constant progress, as we send groans of sympathy towards our compatriots further west when we watch their tortured tracks crawl over the sea. The system that promises to wallop the fleet should present us with strong northerlies when we are reaching across the top of the next gate, but we need to get there before it strikes otherwise we’ll be in for a rough ride too.

Rest is short, and often not that sweet as every major lurch heralds a call from the cockpit and another sail change. We have just downloaded a long range GRIB file that forecasts a slow approach to the Tasman Sea and our arrival date being pushed ever backwards. Fresh food is, as always, a constant dream and topic of conversation and while Sam and I have well documented differences of opinions about whether one should pat sheep or eat them, he has admitted that a fresh salad would be his first pick come stepping onto the pontoon. Perhaps I’m rubbing off on him!

A few days ago Sam and I were a little underwhemled by the beginnings of our dive into the southern ocean. We had flat seas, crisp clear air and warm sunshine. Well now we’ve got the good stuff, Grade A Southern Comfort. Since chafing through our fractional halyard we had been sailing under solent and main for 36 hours or so but still putting in good miles from the comfort of the interior with just Knut the autopilot stoicly standing watch. But with a slight drop in speed and having seen over our shoulder that the Fields had clearly put up a gennaker to stay ahead of the front we couldn’t hang around. Up again with the Code 5 and the world turned white! The spray we currently have on deck is not one’s garden hose atomizer “lets water the roses” type spray as we now have the full fat whiteout sheets of water with droplets the size of bricks type spray. But for all the water around
Cessna Citation is still skipping lightly over the water without any alarming nose dives.

We’ve also just broken our previous speed record from leg one. There we were chasing hard under big spinnaker in high drama and we turned in a respectable 325 miles in 24 hours, but we’ve now just done 343 miles and for most of that we were inside taking tea! Fantastic stuff

Cessna Citation crossed the Celox Sailing Scoring Gate in first place shortly after 15:00 GMT on Saturday. Colman and Goodchild take the maximum 6 points