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The Expedition yacht

Podorange, a 67' challenge yacht is owned and skippered by Brice, supported by his partner Corrine and helped by Orlan. Despite being French, Brice having a love of Ukrainian folk music and Corrine (Coco) insisting on showing me a book of her dog, they were outstanding ... it was a privilege to be on their yacht and see them at work.

Podorange was built for the BT challenge round-the-world race in 1996. It has a length of 67', beam 17' and weights 42 tons. It is sloop rigged with three sails; a 100sqm mainsail combined with a front stay-sail and a yankee. It is steel bodied with a stainless steel deck, galley/saloon under deck box, 2 rear cabins, 4 front cabins, 2 toilets, and a sail/storeroom. With wind, and sailed conservatively, the yacht would average 7 knots sometimes reaching up to 10. The yacht has been owned by Brice for 8 yrs and is one of the few expedition yachts in the region.

Whilst sailing the Drake passage we had 4 groups of watches of 2 hours (i.e. 2 on, 6 off) with a crew member for the crossing. Jim/Manu/I had sunset/sunrise watches, excellent : ) It's blxxdy cold on these watches as you are static for 2 hours .. sometimes being lashed by wind and sleet. Typically we cooked breakfast, the crew cooked dinner and we helped washing up.

We sailed from Ushuaia (Argentina) to Puerto Williams (Chile) then down past Cape Horn and across the Drake passage past the South Shetland islands to the Antarctica peninsula, 1000km over 4 days. Podorange then supported us whilst we skied in various locations on the peninsula and nearby islands.