America's Cup Race 3 - The Kiwis triumph in the end!

So I got the privilege (maybe) of watching this race from a spectator boat up close and personal on the water next to the race course.

Our boat left the dock at 12:30pm, was going to go out, sail around a bit, serve us lunch and then allow us a front row seat at the start, the 3rd mark and the finish of the race. This is all in theory of course...

We boarded the boat and it left shortly after 12:30. Dad and I found a spot near the back of the boat and we enjoyed the views of the harbor as we motored out into the Mediterranean, where the racing was to be held. As soon as we cleared the harbor, we were treated with 6-10 foot swells. At this point, I began to feel a little motion sick so I had a coke. After about 5 minutes, I didn't feel any better so I took some medicine to stop my stomach from arguing with my inner ear. When the chop didn't subside any and I kept feeling worse, I put on a seasick band that sent a pulse of electricity through my middle two fingers on my right hand. I also took a spot in the exact middle of the Catamaran so that the rocking would be minimized.

There I sat for the next 6 hours while the race was postponed from 3pm to 5pm. What I did see was some good racing though...

New Zealand got the early lead, stretching it out to over 400m at one point over Alinghi on the first leg. They then rounded the first mark and again smoked Alinghi on the downwind leg. Rounding the second mark, NZ botched their sail change, getting their spinnaker caught in the jib clue while taking it down. This cost them some valuable time, allowing Alinghi to catch and pass them on the upwind leg 3. The last leg was a shootout between TNZ and Alinghi to see who could get to the finish first, both teams taking a different path. Due to wind shifts and other factors (NZ Rules!) they were able to pass Alinghi at the last moment. It was as an exciting race as I could muster from my one spot near the center of the boat, but I was glad that I was able to see a race from the water.

One of the other cool things was the jockeying for position that the spectator boats did to get a front row seat at the start/finish. With multi billions of dollars of boats lined up, all trying for a front spot, it's amazing there was no carnage. Occasionally, one boat would be spit out formation to avoid colliding with other boats and the first mate on our boat did have a heated exchange with the crew of a multi-million dollar yacht, but for the most part, it was uneventful.

Pics

Check the link list in the right hand column where you will find our personal blogs and now introducing the photo gallery. Woohoo.

In general

On the off day of racing we explored the inner city which is lovely; beautiful building fronts, clean small streets, and of course the Holy Grail. The only damper on going for a walking tour was that the high of the day was 41 degrees C. It was also a Monday which means not all of the stores were open. It seems like Sundays are completely shutdown and Monday is about half and half (they say don’t eat the fish on Monday because no one fishes on Sunday…we tried it…no deaths yet).

The Valencians themselves you probably wouldn’t be able to pick out from anyone else walking the streets in the US. There is more fashion but nothing over the top. The one thing that might be brought to your attention is that they are all slender, the young and old. Maybe this is because they all smoke all of the time? This feels to me as a soft introduction to traveling the world. I have warm running water, bathrooms to be found when I need (especially since they are catering to the American Cup visitors), a bed, washer, etc. The enormity of what lies ahead though hits me when I ride on the coattails of my compadres who are fluent in Spanish. I imagine soon we will truly learn the meaning of “a picture is worth a thousands words”.

NZ wins race #2!

The second day we again traveled to the Port for round 2 where we helped cheer on the Kiwis to a victory. We stayed at the Port until dinner walking around checking out the sights. The day does not follow the same rhythm that you would see in the US. As tourist we are even a little more off the normal schedule everyone seems to follow. We tend to rise around 9 or 10 for breakfast and then sometimes there is a lunch around noon or 1 but tapas follows in the late afternoon between 3-5pm I would say. We seem to get hungry around 6ish which has proved to be a very bad time to find anyone willing to serve us a snack. The reason you eat a snack so late is because restaurants don’t even open their doors and start taking reservations until 9pm. Dinner doesn’t end until 11 or midnight where the locals will then go to their disco clubs and we of course wander back home and finish up the night. When we found a place at the Port for some tapas and to wait for our dinner reservations we found out that it is best to avoid bars where there are a lot of Kiwis celebrating the victory of the day. Don’t get me wrong, the Kiwis are fun but this day it seemed they had drank the bar out of all the beer! Good times.

Valencia at last

Despite the lack of updates we did arrive in Valencia Saturday morning 1AM and started our sightseeing the same day by taking the metro to the Port to watch on the big screen Race #1 of the America’s Cup final duel – Alinghi SUI vs. Emirates NZ. Alinghi won this first round.

The apartment we are staying in with Papa and Mama Clarke is in Rufasa SouthEast of the inner city. It is a short walk from basically everywhere. We walked from the train station, walked to the metro, came back and walked to dinner…it is wonderful! What is not wonderful is the wine. So far we have not taken to the different taste of the Red wines from Rioja and the one White we tried to order ended up being carbonated, go figure.

Spain's Landscape: 10:52PM 6-22-07

It’s dark now and you can’t really see much out the windows, except for a few lights from the cars on the roads that we’re crossing. I was really surprised by the landscape of Spain – it’s extremely arid, almost southwestern if you had to compare it to the US. I’m not sure what they do with most of their land, but occasionally you’d catch a glimpse of a farm of some sort with rows of trees or grape vines. We’ll definitely spend some time investigating more detail about this country. There are more rolling hills on the way from Madrid to Valencia than there were surrounding the airport in Munich.

Traveling By Train: 6-22-07

Traveling by train:

10:30PM
This definitely beats flying. It’s much less expensive, deadly silent and the food is better. I believe that the train that we’re on is supposed to be traveling close to 220kph, but I have yet to see it get that fast. Maybe there are a lot of cows on the tracks or something.

11:00PM
Correction, now we’re flying. The lights are streaking past and I think we’re about to jump into hyperspace!

Madrid Subway Impressions:

Madrid Subway is the way to go. It’s fast, clean, well lit (seems safe) and well marked so that even two idiots with everything they own on their backs can navigate their way from the airport to the train station for 2 euros each.

6-22-07 21:10 Spain Time

I think we made it… well at least we’re on the train.

We’ve managed to catch the last train (last two tickets possibly) to Valencia from Madrid. It’s been an extremely long day and now hopefully I can relax on our last 3 hr train ride from Madrid (Central Spain) to Valencia (Eastern Coast on the Mediterranean). There can be no more thunderstorm delays of 3 hours on the tarmac (JFK), missed connections (Munich), or figuring out new subway or train system.

The List

This past week has flown by as we try to complete the odds and ends that will allow us to put our life on hold for the next year. I've never made a longer list, nor have I completed so many items on a list. I think my wife's about ready to scream - she hates lists with a passion. ;-)

A couple of things are left to do in our last day in the US - we've got to put our cell phones on hold, stuff the remaining items that we have here in storage, and send all the things that we have of other people's back to them. Do we have any of your stuff that you want back before we leave? Let us know, else you're not getting for at least a year!

Steve

Cheap Ass? - Yes, that's me.

I've definitely taken a page from my grandfather on my father's side. He still drinks Milwaukee's Best Light because he refuses to pay more than $5 for a case.

So is it unreasonable to think that a sleeping bag that I've used for 13 years (all through Boy Scouts) should continue to be cutting edge and small to pack? Some how I was caught off guard today when I tried to pack everything into my pack and saw that my sleeping bag was taking up 50% of the available room. But, like most other things with this trip, a good solution fell into my lap. I was able to find a suitable replacement (Mountain Hardware Lamina 35 - synthetic filling to boot) for a great price. When Jesse's down bag gets wet and doesn't work any more, I'll still be toasty and warm. Haha!

I've also feared that we'll die poor when I spend money on traveling/hiking clothing to replace the stuff that I've had since Philmont Scout Ranch in 1997. It's really amazing how far clothing has come since then (like fabrics that don't hold stink), but there's a built in resistance to buying new stuff for myself. Weird. I'm officially over it though, as we've reoutfitted ourselves quite nicely to travel the world. And anything that we've forgotten, I'm sure we can pick up along the way.

Peace,
Steve

Visas - Egypt

India was such an ordeal that it needed two parts to adequately describe the experience at the Indian Consulate.

On the other hand, Egypt was quite a non-event. Based on the cues from the previous day, we tried to show up to the Egyptian Consulate about 30 minutes early. We signed in with building security in the lobby and were about to proceed up to the consulate when the security guard said that we weren't even allowed into the building until 9:30. With our 30 minutes, we went to get coffee.

We returned at 9:31 and were then allowed into the building. Taking the elevator to the 19th floor, we entered the one roomed Egyptian consulate. There was no one in the waiting room and no one at the service desk. I rang the bell and a woman came to help us. While passing documents, money and photos to this woman, I noticed that she was behind at least 2 inches of security glass. Wow. I couldn't remember the same at the Indian consulate. I wonder whether this was done by the people in the Egyptian consulate for their protection or was it done by our government, thinking that the Egyptian consulate may attract the type of people that would be deterred by 2" thick security glass.

We returned at 10:30am the next morning - next day service for this consulate, and picked up our passports with their Egyptian Visas.

One step closer to leaving.

Visas - India Part 2

I returned solo this time, because Jesse was at Yoga, fighting Chicago traffic (horrible by the way) to pick up our Indian Visas. Miraculously, I found street parking near the consulate and made my way back up to the 11th floor of the NBC building. This time I was early, because I wanted to get a jump on the "line" that I thought would form outside the closed Consulate. All signs at the consulate indicated that the waiting area was closed from noon until 3:30pm. I figured that if I lined up early, (15 minutes) I'd be close to the front of the line and get out of there early.

I arrived on the 11th floor to realize that the consulate was not closed at all. The waiting room was again full of people (most who I'd seen earlier in the day). I went to take a number and realized that there were NO numbers available. Did they run out? I asked two very surly businessmen that I had ridden the elevator with (doing their best not to make eye contact - why is that?) So anyways, I took a seat close to where the number were supposed to be. At 3:35 this man comes out of the back room (where you could hear the workers SCREAMING at each other in another language) and walks towards the device that held the numbers. I watched a couple people, who looked like they knew what they were doing, get up immediately when they saw this guy, so I jumped up too. He put the numbers in the dispensing device and ran to avoid the grab fest that was about to ensue. Because I was one of the first 5 to grab a number, I got trapped in the mob of people grabbing for numbers - they didn't care how many numbers they were taking, they were just grabbing. It was hysterical. I wasn't able to get out, so I just stood in the way thinking that if no one was able to get a number, they'd surely let me out. Not so.

Is this a lesson I should learn for India? Is this behavior indicative of a culture where 1 Billion people exist in one country? Get what you're looking for and get the hell out of the way!

The same gentleman who had waited on us in the morning was still working in the afternoon session, but his behavior was more akin to the Soup Nazi than in the morning. You'd hand him your receipt, tell him your last name, and he'd give you your passports and move onto the next number. A couple of people tried to ask him questions - he'd have none of it and moved onto other customers. I took this to heart, handed him my receipt, told him my last name and said "Thanks" as he handed me my passports. I split, checking to see whether we got Visas in the elevator on the way down.

We were successful - one down, one to go!

Visas - India Part 1

So our trip to Chicago was a complete success. We obtained the two visas we needed for leg 1 of our journey - India and Egypt.

Each consulate was a completely different experience, which I think speaks to each of the different cultures and America's attitudes towards each culture.

The Indian Consulate was located in a large suite on the 11th floor of the NBC building in Chicago. It was quite a happening place, brimming with activity even before the official opening time of 9:30 am. Jesse and I strolled through the doors just past 9:30 and took a number to be waited on. The place was full of all different sorts of people - business travelers, tourists, students, expatriated families trying to get back home to visit their families, and philanthropists. We took number 92 and glanced at the board that told us what number was currently being served - 69... We knew there'd be a wait. I wondered how that many people grabbed a number in the 5 minutes that had elapsed since 9:30 (my answer would come later that day).

It was about an hour before we were waited on and we watched intently as the different types of people approached the counter, each one trying something different. Some were obviously prepared, others tried screaming at the man behind the counter, others seemed to not feel they needed to take a number and just approached the window between orderly customers. I can't say that all approaches yielded the same degrees of success.

Finally it was our turn to approach the window, which we did, all documents in hand. From start to finish it took us about 2 minutes to hand in our paperwork, passports, and pay our money (of course). We left with intentions to return at 3:30 to pick up our passports and (hopefully) visas.