What a whirlwind it has been, adding Dubai as a pit stop, into the mix of Sailing Arabia The Tour. A day of rest was taken from the Ras Al Khaimah (RAK), UAE, stopover, so that the fleet could do a quick jaunt to the city. If going into Doha, Qatar, at night reminds one of Las Vegas, then going into Dubai at night is like going to Disney’s Magic Kingdom. Amazing buildings, and skyline… We stayed at the Holiday Inn Express – a brief taste of home!
The Omani girls have been making solid progress, but like all progress it is a couple steps forward, and a couple steps back. This especially occurs when they are tired. In the in-port race at Abu Dhabi, the girls racing were on fire. They were trimming, attentive, the kite went up and down smoothly (for the most part), and we had a good result. However, a race like this is an endurance race, so our long nights and early mornings were especially telling by their exhaustion. They are not used to it, and its hard to train for. With prize giving, and lunch in the sun, the girls were pretty tired that night. Because of the added pit stop in Dubai, and a well thought out desire to finish in daylight or early evening, the start the next morning from Abu Dhabi was breakfast at 4:00 am, bus at 4:30/5:00 am, and off the dock at 6:00 am. In our debrief, prior to the leg to Dubai, we discussed that it takes some time to ‘get going’ in the mornings. Because of this, we told the girls to be on the 4:30 am bus. The next morning, the girls not only missed the bus, they failed to show up (metaphorically) until late in the morning! We coaches completely rigged the boat, sorted the food, water and made sure that all were off the dock timely.
The 4th SATT leg was a really nice sail, and by late morning when our Omani girls started to wake up, they got into it – but it took a lot of time. The finish was hard fought, with the Dutch. We had been fighting them the entire way, and were literally only meters off their stern as we came towards the finish line. Although we faked them out with a fake gybe to break away, they had the favored side of the course, and just beat us. It was a nice day.
The race from Dubai to RAK was meant to start at 10:00 am in the morning, in order to have raced in daylight – which as it turns out, would have been a dramatically better situation. Due to a complete fiasco with customs, we were delayed on shore until 1:30 am. This caused us to get into RAK at midnight, with an immediate turn-around in the morning to head to the boats for in-port racing! UGH. However, being tired ended up the least of our concerns, because it turned out the leg was covered in huge swaths of gill nets – most portions unlit with occasional flashers, and fisherman flashing lights at us at one end (if you were lucky). If you check the tracker you will see that our fleet would be moving along, and then be brought to a shuddering halt. This caused some to wipeout, from going downwind, and then becoming mired in the fishing nets. Some got off, some did not, and required fisherman to help, or sailors to jump in to try to clear the nets (dangerous). We were in fifth at the first waypoint, but after dodging a few nets, our time was up. We ended up firmly stuck in a huge net for over an hour. As competitors sailed away, I contemplated jumping in, but there were fisherman coming, so I decided to wait. The girls handled the wipeouts and craziness well – and negotiated help from the fisherman in arabic, which was handy. Eventually, we got going, and it was us and the Dutch again, heading toward the finish. But this time the wind died, and we didn’t make the time limit. So frustrating, and we didn’t get to the hotel until 1:00 am. Double UGH.
So today, at 11:00 am, was in-port racing. The girls were physically shattered. We rotated in our two backups to give Tahira and Raja a break. Raiya and Intisar, our veterans, were onboard. Intisar is trimming and has really come a long way. Raiya, taking on the big job of bow, and having been seasick the night before, was showing signs of exhaustion today. But like the amazing trooper she is, she put on a brave face, and took it on. Tomorrow’s leg is the second longest, and also a very difficult one around the Strait of Hormuz. A tricky place to sail. Our briefing is at 7:00 pm tonight, and I am sure we will cover safety again. I believe we will be required to stay even closer to land than last year. The good news is that as of the time I headed over here, there was no pirate activity, and it appears pretty quiet. At any rate, I believe we will have a military escort again, and besides – one of the boats is from the Oman Navy, so what can go wrong? 🙂
~Katie
Photos by Lloyd Images
