Phil Eadie – the veteran Ragamuffin navigator remembers some more forgetful days racing offshore (2016)
“Just about every Hobart we’d leave something behind. Once we left the blankets on the dock. Once we didn’t have any milk. Another time we didn’t have any matches to light the stove. We pulled the cabin lights apart and shorted the wires over a little cup of metho to make a flame and get the stove going.
And once we even left the spinnaker pole behind and someone had to come roaring out with it in a dinghy. Another time we were doing a coastal race through the night and it turned out that all there was for breakfast was toast and Bonox. I remember Syd saying, ‘Fuck! I’ve spent a fucking fortune on this boat and that’s the only fucking thing they can bring – toast and Bonox!’”
