AROUND THE LAND OF THE LONG WHITE CLOUD

This morning has been hell. I am too exhausted to fill in all the details but suffice to say we are now running under bare poles in 50-60 knot winds, making 5-10 knots in giant seas. We get smashed fairly regularly by breaking waves but the boat’s fine and apart from a wave that just forced the main hatch open and drenched everything, we are getting on nicely. This was forecast to be 35 knots and it sure as hell isn’t. I hope it eases off soon,’ noted Mike Delamore in his log.

He is one of the few people to have solo circumnavigated New Zealand. This is perhaps not surprising, given the rugged nature of the south-west coast of the South Island off Fiordland, and the south-east coast of the North Island off the Wairarapa, where the trimaran capsized in 1989. Her crew spent 119 days adrift on the boat’s wreckage before being