It's been one of those massively hectic weeks where have really valued escaping even for a few minutes onto the Volvo Ocean Race web site. Compared to meetings, presentations, teleconferences, papers, projects, networking etc etc sailing non-stop four hours on four hours off seemed like a really good way to spend one's time.
So in return here are some of my photos with indirect connections to the Volvo. For example the one above I took when sailing near the Canary Islands which Groupama has, in an interesting navigational choice, just passed to the east (bonus marks for identifying the class of yacht).
Below are fishing dhows in Abu Dhabi, which is also the name one of the teams in the VOR. Alas they had a rather too dramatic start to the leg to South Africa, dismasting before they'd even left the Med.
So this is what Abu Dhabi didn't see - one of the Pillars of Hercules, the Rock of Gibraltar. When I was there we had no wind whatsoever, and hence had to motor. We passed a racing fleet that was drifting rather a lot: