44' 56S 50' 26E

Happy Easter everybody! Unfortunately no long weekend holiday for the crew of BP Explorer. We suggested to David that it was an official bank holiday at home and that even the DIY stores would not be open but he was unrelenting so we soldier on. As it happens we have been the fastest boat over the last six hours averaging 9.6 knots and are making some impact on the general positions up front. The gains really are quite small in the last 24 hours though, as least smaller than we'd like. We have taken two miles out of Imagine It. Done but nothing out of Spirit of Sark who seem to be matching our efforts almost mile by mile. We have however, taken nine miles from Pindar and Team Stelmar but we are far from safe yet. Better news is the expanding gap between BG Spirit and us to get a good overall points result for this leg we need plenty of boats separating us so every mile added is a good one.


By the end of today we should have passed the Crozet Islands which are about 70 miles to the South of us, then it's only 1600 miles to Cape Town. The first of the layers has been shed as the temperatures, even at night, have got a bit warmer. During the day there is even some sunshine and the sunglasses are being dug out from deep within our Curver boxes in recognition of this fact. Yesterday we had the spinnakers out again and we flattened out but as I write this log the wind has come forward again and we are back to the familiar yellow sails and 28 degrees of heel. We are set to keep this point of sail for the next 24 hours. Giles Mackey, on Cops watch, has been doing an excellent job of picture taking however; it has highlighted a strange fact. It would seem that most of the fellas on Olly's watch are clean-shaven while those on Cop's have a fine thatch of facial hair. John Stewart claims it's because their watch are more macho, we are convinced that they are a bit shy of getting their chins cold. It is often the best indicator of whether someone has seized the opportunity, in the calm conditions, to take a shower. A possible explanation is that John is trying to beat his current record of over three weeks between soakings and has encouraged his watch to do the same. The exceptions are Stephen Allberry on Olly's watch with his wizard-like beard and Cop who is as smooth as a baby's bum. We have celebrated Easter in the customary fashion of chocolate Easter eggs and chocolate bunnies but I'm not convinced they were delivered by the enormous Albatross, with the eleven-metre wingspan, as mentioned in Naomi's log yesterday. She did, I'm sure, mean eleven feet. However, when it comes to Albatross delivering chocolate eggs to Challenge racing yachts why let facts get in the way of a good story.

John Bass