French Bureaucracy

Following a hassle free and straightforward registration, yesterday was our ISAF safety inspection. The ISAF OSR (off shore racing) requirements in the context of a classic yacht are, well, lets say "bureaucratic". Despite years of hassle free safe racing in the UK, an IRC piece of paper (albeit out of date) that claims we comply with ISAF OSR regs, and safe arrival here under a skipper with thousands of ocean miles to his name, we do not comply. James was not impressed.

ISAF OSR inspection - we failed

Guard rails - we need to have them closed at the bow and stern despite having no push- or pulpit. The Blue Peter has no guard rails, but we were told that she applied for an exemption. Most of the other boats do not have closed guard rails. We are going to have to deface Croix des Guards with lines of useless and unsightly ropes, at least for the start.

Altering door hinges to comply with ISAF - why is Dave laughing?

Washboards - Francois is insisting we demonstrste we have "planks" at hand the same dimensions as our companionway doors. The entrance to the doghouse is huge. In an emergency, we would cut at the chart table to secure an opening in heavy weather but this is not adequate. The fact that we have seven glass skylights which are more vulnerable seems to have passed ISAF by.

The cooker is not secure enough. Francois worries that if we roll, the cooker could jump out of the gimbal and rupture the gas line - which is already off and isolated in the galley ceiling. However, this is not enough and James has to work out how to make a bracket to keep the cooker in. If the weather is heavy enough to roll us, we won't be cooking anyway so the gas won't be on. Gah.

Fitting bilge level alarms on the electrics panel

And so it continues....Most of the regs are rubbish, like we only "need" two fire extinguishers (we carry seven plus one for the engine bay). Softwood bungs must be tied to every sea cock, not stored centrally in the doghouse etc. We've already spent literally thousands on attempting to comply with mandatory safety equipment such as sat phone, AIS, EPIRB, extra bilge pumps etc.

Anyway, we did get to go to a rather nice unofficial party downtown at a local pub with non-stop sangria and beer, as well as tapas. Our crew did the decent thing and stayed to the end so they could sound out the opposition. I think Ollie is still broken....

Our crew ply the opposition with beers to sound out their weaknesses