Well the Dragon has made it across.  We are all pretty happy and have just been taking it all as one step at a time. 

Luck has changed our way and we had a good trip across to China with about 20-knots of wind and mostly pointing at the mark. Then a few lucky shifts and we are now down to about 400 nm to go, almost a Sydney to Gold Coast race.

A few days ago Ian wanted us to have another go at strengthening the bulkhead. We tried a different approach this time and used our existing repair as a base and glued and bolted sail battens up the bulkhead.  This has worked a treat and appears to spread the load up the face of the bulkhead well.

Getting pretty cold on board and even Neal McDonald has got a balaclava and gloves on.  We are going to approach the real cold spot in the next day or so.  Water temp at the moment is about 10 degrees and should get down to 2 degrees. Madness. Hopefully the weather stays kind to us until the finish and we get the Dragon there in one piece.

Tom Braidwood – Pitman/Trimmer