Day 43 – The team behind Doris part 2

Laura PenhaulBy

Day 43 – The team behind Doris part 2

In my Day 28 blog I mentioned about how there are a certain few people back home that have and are making this journey special and that without them I have no doubt that we wouldn’t be here today.

The next influential person I want to introduce you to in more detail is our Sports Psychologist, Keith Goddard (Zeus Performance Psychology). Without a shadow of a doubt, Keith has been a rock to this project, the team and to me personally. He has contributed so much to this row, but unbelievably he has done it all in his own time and voluntarily. He has been significant in team selection, for our preparation to get to the start line, for our on the water scenarios, for individual coping strategies, for support to our families and so much more.

I know Keith through my work; Keith and I worked together at the London Paralympics 2012 with Paralympics GB. In this role Keith was working with all of the Paralympic staff/ support team to the athletes to aid our process of communication, understanding of one another and the various roles within the organisation, alongside facilitating ‘what if’ scenarios to ensure we were best prepared as a team going into the Games. We were just coming to the end of the holding camp prior to the London games starting and all the staff knew of my plans to row an ocean. Keith approached me and, for his sins, he kindly offered his services if I needed them. I am sure without doubt that poor Keith had no idea what he had in store for himself. I knew at the time that this row would be 90% mentally challenging and having seen how supportive and influential he had been with us at work, there was no hesitation how much his expertise would be an asset to our row. At the time, the row was only intended to have a 1 year prep time and 6 months at sea. 3.5 years later with delays due to team change, lack of sponsorship and finances, we finally reached the start after a number of hurdles were faced and overcome. Without question, if it wasn’t for Keith, I’m sure I would have questioned continuing forwards and making it to the start line.

So 3.5 years for Keith has encompassed; helping me to co-ordinate team selection (2 full weekends of his time for interviews, then a weekend with www.fieri.biz for army based sleep deprivation in the Brecons, plus hours of preparation for how to assess each applicant), once a month telephone or Skype conversations with each of the team members involved at that time, once a month full team meeting for a whole day (this usually resided in the Hare & Hounds Pub in Bath where the food is amazing and we could constantly feed Keith with lattes), once a month face to face when he could with each of us but certainly me throughout the time he’s been involved (often I’d meet him at 7am at Waterloo station or around 5pm before or after he had travelled up from Bath for work meetings). This is all pre-row preparations. While we’re now on the water, he’s meeting with Lizanne and Meg to facilitate their transition into the team and he liaises with our families and is a mediator as to whether negative news can be shared with us or not. He also sends us a daily quote and once a week he receives a team review from us.

Not for the first time, it makes me feel quite emotional to think of all this time, expertise, patience and shared belief in the row that Keith has volunteered. What’s worse is that so far I feel there is little we have done to return the gratitude we feel. Ideally we would have loved to get Keith out to Hawaii, not only to facilitate the transition of Lizanne swapping in from Izz, but it would also be a thanks to get him involved on the ground during the project. Unfortunately, the unexpected costs incurred in Santa Barbara have eaten into our contingency budget somewhat and with 2 more legs to go we haven’t been able to afford the cost of Keith’s flights. Skype however is a wonderful thing, so we will have to make do with learning about the Friday funky chicken dance and other quirky habits he has over Skype ;)!

There are very few Keith Goddards in this world and we are so lucky, humbled and proud to have him in our lives. Now we just need to get to Cairns so that a successful trip is a reflection on all his kind efforts. Thank you Keith. X

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Day 42 – Here comes the sun

Isabel BurnhamBy

Day 42 – Here comes the sun

The last few days have finally brought us some warmer weather and some sunshine. We currently have the wind behind us and are surfing towards Hawaii. Doris moves beautifully through the waves. We’re so lucky to have her. A big hello and thank you to Cris and the team at Rossiter Yachts where she was built.

Everyone is enjoying the sun and is in high spirits. The Pacific looks beautiful in the bright light and we have been treated to some gorgeous sunsets and sunrises. The arrival of the sun means it’s all change aboard Doris as we switch our routines into summer mode. Doubtless it will only get hotter from now on, so we’d better start getting used to the new ways…..

Wardrobe: during the day, thermals are being put away and vest tops and shorts are making appearances, with long sleeve cover ups worn when the sun is too fierce. By night, a combination of the warmth and the reduced splash (as the swell is now following us rather than beam on) means that we are managing to keep our Crewsaver wet weather salopettes off, although we are usually still wearing the jackets as wind breakers. There is usually a consultation between those in the cabin about to emerge for their rowing shift and those on deck as to the optimal outfit for the conditions. Not wearing wet weather gear greatly reduces the time required to get ready to go out on deck, is more comfortable for rowing in and reduces the potential for Velcro-related trauma discussed in one of my previous blogs!

Water: our water consumption has gone up dramatically so we have our desalinator running for longer each day. We are all drinking more water in the hotter temperatures, often with added SOS Rehydrate rehydration salts. We each have Camelbak sports water bottles in holders out on deck to drink while we’re on the oars, as well as drinking in our breaks. The sunshine means that nearly every day is a good day for washing kit and Doris is now constantly draped with drying clothes. We also took the opportunity to all have another solar shower out on deck on Sunday and are all feeling much better for it.

Suncream: the suncream routine has started to take up a larger and larger part of our day. We apply and reapply our factor 50 suncream throughout the day and then use our lovely aftersun from Green People once it is cooler and before the night shifts start. Our panda eyes and life jacket tan lines are coming along nicely.

Cabin: the cabin is getting hot, hot, HOT! We have the hatches shut when we’re not moving in and out to prevent any water coming in, so it gets very toasty. Ironically, it is the rowers doing the work on the oars who are cooler in the breeze and the pair having their rest in the cabin who are sweating. We have stowed the sleeping bags away and are now only using our Sea to Summit silk sleeping bag liners at night.

Food: our hearty hot expedition meals which were previously such a comfort when we were wet and cold now bring us out in food sweats and consequently take a lot longer to eat. One bonus of the sun is that we can use it to heat up the wet rations that we have by leaving the foil packet on deck to get warm, rather than immersing it in boiling water. On the food front we had a big treat on Sunday when we ate an astronaut food cookies and cream ice cream sandwich that Claire Hammond from our sponsor Raymarine and her sons had kindly given to us. It was such a treat to eat something different and it really tasted like cookies and cream ice cream! Thanks so much to Claire and the boys.

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Day 41 – Let’s get physical

Natalia CohenBy

Day 41 – Let’s get physical

Update:

  • We believe we have passed our half way mark! Woohhhoooooo!! We haven’t seen our miles made good table but by careful scrutiny of our chart plotter it certainly appears that way.
  • I officially went the longest I have ever gone without washing my hair! 40 days and 40 nights. It was washed yesterday whilst we had our second group shower on deck. Amazing!
  • It was a spectacular sunset, clear starry night and a sunrise that led to a day of prevailing wind and clear blue sky. LP and I woke from our rest shift at 10.15am dripping with sweat! The aft cabin was roasting. If it’s not too cold it’s too hot! Are we ever satisfied??! This is a taste of things to come, as from now on it’s just going to get hotter and hotter.
  • We had a great social hour today, where we all got out on deck and did some stretching led by LP.

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We would say that this journey is 90% mental but…

Maybe you’re interested in what is happening to us physically.
LP has collaborated with GSK to do research on what could possibly happen to us out here during an expedition of this type and length (more detailed, scientific info regarding the research pre, mid and post row to come on a later blog by LP).

In the meantime I thought I’d do a simple run down in layman’s terms on what the last 41 days has brought.

In order to have the necessary extra reserves, we all had to put on between 7-12kg, increase our fat percentage and gain substantial muscle mass before beginning the row. This programme was drawn up by the amazing Alex Wolf (Strength & Conditioning Coach) in conjunction with LP.

Whether from the cramped conditions during the rest periods or the 12 hours of rowing that we do daily, here is some of the physical symptoms we have been experiencing:

Muscle soreness
– Tired/aching legs
– Stiff neck, back and shoulders – general stiffness in the body as we are mainly hunching, crouching or crawling around the aft cabin when we are not rowing.

Joint pain
– Claw Hand is probably the worst ailment for some of us. Every time we wake from a 2 hour rest shift, our hands have seized up. LP says that this is tendon related as well and has given us tendon gliding exercises to do (she can explain more about this). Getting dressed can be a little bit of a challenge as well as the first 10 or so strokes on the oars before we get warmed up.

– Seat bone pain is an issue for some. We are spending an usually large time sitting and for some with more pronounced seat bones or less ‘padding’, this has started to cause discomfort. We have a variety of different seat options to try and help with this problem but for some, getting out on the oars for a 2 hour row shift is just a pain in the arse!

Muscle wasting – Most of the amazing muscles that we had when we launched…have sadly disappeared.
This was expected but personally I never knew how quickly it would happen.
If you don’t use it, you lose it, so as we are only using a very select group of muscles out here, the others are wasting. Again, LP will go into more detail regarding this and all the varying exercises we need to do to ensure that we stay as conditioned as we can given the unique environment we are living in.

Other – The strangest things are happening to our nails! They have white marks beginning to run down from the nail toward the cuticle. Possible calcium deficiency but they seem to be improving somewhat the drier we remain. –

Hands – we’re not doing too badly here. We all have nice calluses developing on both hands at the base of our index, middle and ring fingers. These are rock solid and make putting suncream on our own faces and bodies an interesting process as it feels terrible!

– Skin This has been constantly peeling/flaking away on our hands and on some people’s feet. This makes clothes washing interesting as all our relatively clean clothes are covered in our dead skin from our hands as we wring them out before drying!
We need to be careful to maintain good hygiene routines to help prevent fungal and bacterial infections which are a constant risk with the wet conditions. I fear that this may increase the further west we travel and the hotter and more humid the weather becomes.

– Bums – Angry bum has already been mentioned and we’re happy to report that since we have been drier this has improved dramatically. There can still be issues with chaffing and we need to be aware that the situation with angry bum can revert quickly as soon we are getting splashed again and have to move back into our wet weather gear all the time!

– Sleep deprivation

– Sun damage

Once again…it’s fascinating to see what we usually take for granted…
Standing straight on solid ground
Being still
Having the space and capacity to exercise, stretch, and work all areas of the body and have a variety of movement…

Regardless of the adverse conditions we find ourselves in here on Doris, in the middle of the almighty Pacific, it is truly amazing to witness first hand how adaptable the body actually is.
I have no doubt there will be more physical challenges ahead…but together, as a team, we will share, face and overcome them x

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Day 40 – Row time, nap time, row time, nap time…

Emma MitchellBy

Day 40 – Row time, nap time, row time, nap time…

Beep beep, beep beep! Beep beep, beep beep! Probably my least favourite sound on Doris is the sound of the alarm waking us up after a far too short sleep ready for another shift on the oars. So much so that I regularly hear it in my dreams and wake up in a panic thinking we are late getting ready. Sleep deprivation seems to confuse me a lot and I have woken all of the other girls up multiple times thinking we need to rush and get ready only to be told to go back to sleep. Poor LP got woken up by me twice last night and is probably glad we have swapped pairs again today.

The alarm triggers an automatic reflex to put our heads back under the sleeping bag and fall back asleep and it is with great reluctance that we start getting ready. Trying to leave the lights off for as long as possible and dress by the glow of the chart plotter we attempt to put as many clothes on as possible without sitting up or leaving the sleeping bag. Putting on leggings in a sleeping bag is a skill we have all developed. Once thermal layers are on it is time to take a deep breath, extract ourselves from the sleeping bag and reach for the wet weather gear. This usually requires switching on the lights to identify who’s is who’s and therefore is accompanied by squinting and groaning. If the wet weather gear is dry this is not too painful. When it is sodden from the previous shift it makes me want to cry. Finally socks, shoes and life jackets have to be put on before exiting into the cold night air. The person in the front rowing seat gets a 10-15min show at the end of their shift watching this performance. It is comical to watch as what seems like getting ready quickly inside the cabin looks painfully slow from outside. Often a person will sit looking at an item of clothing or shoe for a good 10 seconds before figuring out what to do with it. Conversation is usually limited to ‘here’s your jacket’, ‘can you pass my socks’ and ‘thanks’ as we drag ourselves slowly into wakefulness. Occasionally exhaustion gives way to mild hysteria as someone gets stuck in their jacket or gets their head stuck in the leg of their leggings trying to put them on as a top.

Once on the oars we have a variety of strategies for staying awake. On a clear, starry night 2 hours passes quickly with the beautiful scenery. When we are battling with wind and waves this acts as a distraction. However there are also plenty of shifts where I struggle to keep my eyes open and stare longingly into the cabin where the other two are sound asleep. I swear I have actually sleep rowed before waking up with a start with no memory of the previous 20 minutes. The dawn dance helps as does telling stories but the best part of any night shift is re-entering the warm cabin and getting into the sleeping bag ready for another nap. Remembering to set the alarm before we snooze, the cycle starts again.

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An introduction to Lizanne – Rolling with the waves

An introduction to Lizanne – Rolling with the waves

Imagine you’re throwing a dinner party. You don’t know when your guests are arriving, you’re not sure what they like to eat, and you’ve never even cooked before. That is roughly my current situation as I wait for the girls to arrive in Hawaii…

Hi everyone, I’m Lizanne, and I’m a chocoholic

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I am South African, grew up in the UK and am currently living in Cape Town. Izzy will pass the baton onto me in Hawaii and I will row with the girls across to Samoa, where Meg will take over from me and row to Cairns.

I got involved in the row last year and was held as a reserve if ever they needed one…. So I got this call a couple of months ago; “Liz, you still up for it?!”
I have never rowed before – “Yeah sure!”

I have now had 3 months to prepare for a 60+ day stint on an ocean rowing boat; 2 hours on, 2 hours off, 24/7. 3 months to learn everything I can about the sea, organise my practice (which I bought 9 months ago) for my departure, get life insurance (jokes…. sort of) and pick up at least 10-12kg of muscle and fat. It has been a fascinating experience already and I’m not even on the boat yet!

I have started going into the men’s section of the gym and stare at myself in the mirror with an angry face. I have started saying stuff like “I worked my triceps too hard and now I can’t wash my hair”.

I have brownies for breakfast without feeling guilty, I realised I can never have too many eggs and I add butter to everything.

The aspect of the row I’m very intrigued and fascinated by is the mental prep. No doubt it will be a physical challenge, but what will get us all through to the other side is the mental capacity to believe that you can do anything you set your mind to.

Currently there is only one other person who knows what I’m going through- Meg Dyos. She will be taking over from me in Samoa. Look out for her intro blog as she is one of the funniest people I have ever met! She is quickly becoming a soul sister….

We’re both currently just rolling with the waves as we try to prepare ourselves as best we can for something we have never done before. So far it’s been a great ride, and I’m so excited for what is still in store for us

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Day 39 & navigation update

Laura PenhaulBy

Day 39 & navigation update

A few things that have brought joy to us on Doris in the last 24hrs… For the first time in nearly 2 weeks, we have sunshine!! We have had nothing but a constant blanket of grey cloud over us for as far as we could see over the recent weeks and so it’s unbelievable how good it feels to see blue sky. Secondly, our iPad is back up and running! Our iPad is our lifeline to writing the blogs and receiving mail from you, so without it we’d be limited to the phone and we all felt like we would be missing out on sharing our story, which to be honest, writing a blog and reading mail is the highlight of the day.

Finally we received our first contact on VHF. We have used our VHF plenty of times before to contact other boats, but never before has a nearby boat contacted us. So when I heard ‘Doris, Doris this is Marjorie, Marjorie, do you read me over’, we got so excited! Immediately I jumped on the VHF and responded. Chief mate Aaron and Second mate Steve were on a cruise liner from LA to Hawaii, they had contacted us after seeing Doris on AIS & noticed in our boat detail that we were just 8m long. After informing them of our project they were really supportive and turns out they will be at the Pier next to us in Honolulu in mid July when we hope to arrive. We have arranged to contact them on arrival and they plan to come over for a visit whilst also offering us a tour of their boat, which I suspect will be slightly more extravagant than Doris!

In the last 48hrs we have had to drop our course to 200 degrees nearly due South, but this has thankfully worked to help us avoid a high pressure system that would have pushed North East if we had continued West, so thanks to Uncle Tone (Tony Humphries our onshore support) we have missed it.

This is most probably as good a time as any to give a brief description of how we navigate, so that we can answer some of the questions that have been asked via our blogs. Tony Humphries (aka uncle tone to us) tracks our progress daily, whilst monitoring the currents, wind speed and direction. Tony sends us a daily update of the conditions and what course we should hold, via sat phone text, we then liaise with him with what conditions are actually like in situ, but 99% of the time Tony’s predictions are spot on, to the hour. We work to ‘course over ground’ rather than ‘heading’ because we are so influenced by wind and currents that we could be heading/ facing 90 degrees but travelling over the ground 180 degrees. On board Doris we are fortunate enough to be sponsored by Raymarine, who have fully kitted out Doris with equipment and Navionics who have kindly sponsored our maps. So here’s the list of kit aboard:

  • E7 chart plotter: this provides us with the ability to map our location, lat/long, distance travelled, ability to set waypoints and AIS signals of other boats etc.
  • AIS transceiver & receiver: this means we can see boats that are travelling within approx. 15miles of us and we set an alarm so that it alerts us when a boat enters within a 2mile radius of us. This is important when in big seas and at night time when line of sight is impaired. It also transmits a signal so that other boats who should all have an AIS onboard, can see us on their repeater even if they can’t see us by eye looking out at sea (such as boat Marjorie above).
  • p70 deck repeater: this repeats the course over ground from the chart plotter so we can see it on deck and hold ourselves on course.
  • tack tick range: for wind gauge, depth gauge and speed over ground.
  • Evo autopilot : we have only just started using this in the last week, as travelling below 1kt makes the pilot work too hard, so we stuck to hand steering during those times since we left Santa Barbara.
  • Navionics maps : Navionics gold is really clear and gives a great amount of detail when exiting or entering near land. We have maps for the U.S. That cover Hawaii and Samoa, with another card for Australian waters.
    If we were to have an electrical failure, then we have a battery powered handheld GPS as well as the Navionics uploaded via apps on our iPhones and iPads to give us real time, current location. So we’re confident we can maintain our own navigation ability aboard Doris if needed.

Raymarine

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Hope this answers some questions but feel free to let us know if not.

Personal messages:
Heather – so lovely to receive your email hon, thank you for thinking of us it was great to hear your news of little Pip. With regards to X factor – love Grimmy but he’s not a producer/ singer to be a mentor so reckon that is twaddle & JC to finally leave Top Gear, interesting replacement!
Mary – glad all is good at home with you and Daz. In response to your question, no we don’t brush our teeth every 2hrs but usually twice a day still ;).
Jade & Kim- thanks for sorting the flat, exciting news jade about the move. Can’t wait to be back at Ullswater and finally enjoying some social time with you girls when I get back. Xx

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Father’s Day Blog

Natalia CohenBy

Father’s Day Blog

Being out here in the middle of nothingness with all the time in the world, gives you an amazing opportunity to think long and hard about what is important to you in the ‘real world’ and how we have become the people we are. Obviously the main thing that we all agree on is that family is paramount. It is their support, guidance and encouragement that we truly appreciate and are forever thankful to them.

LP and I spent one of today’s shifts taking about our wonderful parents and we reflected on how both of us share a mixture of traits from both our mothers and our fathers (the good bits of course!). There is so much respect and admiration we have for our mums but as it’s Fathers Day today, we thought we would share with you an insight into our fantastic dads and what we believe some of the traits are that we have been lucky enough to have inherited from them.

Laura
My dad has always taught me strong morales, he is a man that is laid back and easy going but will stick to what he believes in. He is compassionate and will show his kind, caring nature in going above and beyond to help others. He’s taught me the art of problem solving and without a doubt has instilled in me to see things through and never give up. On a practical note, I can certainly thank my dad for my driving skills, having been taught from a young age in the fields of Cornwall. This means I love driving any car, at any opportunity, in any location and I’m not a female afraid of parking in small spaces (which came in handy on the hills of San Fran!).
My dad has shown me the values that we share as a team, he has taught me integrity, trust and above all he is my inspirational father figure, that I am very lucky to have. Love you Dad xx

LP and Ray Nat and Bern

Natalia
I get my patience and the love of meeting new people from my dad. He is the peacekeeper in the family and I seem to have also adopted that trait.
My dad has always been one of my heroes. There are many reasons for this but the main one has to be the admiration I feel for him dealing with the huge challenge he faced as a young man. My dad has certainly overcome his own adversity by not only fighting and overcoming cancer but also the life changing experience of losing a limb (right leg, above the knee amputation).
He has always been the most incredible father and encouraged me to be the free spirit that I am. He embodies the values that we live by on Doris by showing not only strength and resilience but also great perseverance. He is my constant inspiration.

To all those fathers out there, Happy Fathers Day!

 

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Days 37 & 38 – Peaks and Troughs

Isabel BurnhamBy

Days 37 and 38 – Peaks and Troughs

The last two days have been marked by technological difficulties. The screen on my Kindle broke first, followed by an iPad that we have on board. I am sad to lose my Kindle as had really been enjoying reading on my off shifts. More important though is the loss of the iPad. We were using it to write and send our daily blogs and emails and to take some photos. We are now using a phone as back up, which is very frustrating, so our blogs might be a little shorter from now on.

On the Pacific, every downturn seems accompanied by a positive though, and the last 48 hours have been rich in wildlife. The pod of 6 enormous whales right next to the boat yesterday in addition to an amazing large electric blue fish with a yellow tail, inquisitive albatross and other birds very close have kept our spirits high.

Nighttime storytelling continues and our collective repertoire is expanding all the time. Last night I told the story of Braveheart and Ems reciprocated with Cool Runnings, a film we both love. We were crying with tears by the end of it recalling some of the one liners.

We are currently keeping a course over ground of 200 degrees as we have been advised that there is an area of high pressure North of us that we should veer South of if we can. The exciting development is that we have passed 1000 nautical miles since leaving San Francisco. You can now see Doris and the Hawaiian islands on the same page of our chart plotter as we make slow but steady progress towards Honolulu!

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Day 37 – Phone cast #2 from Doris

The TeamBy

Day 36 – Phone cast #2 from Doris

“Today has been a special landmark day as we have just hit 1000 nautical miles from Santa Barbara and we’ve had quite an incredible wildlife spotting day too….” Hear more…

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