Friday, 25 June 2009, 06:59 GMT
PUMA - Rick Deppe (Media Crew Member)
A quick blog while we motor the 40 miles out to the start off Sandham, most of the guys are in bunks. Casey is driving the boat and Capey is navigating through the narrow channels.
Stockholm was a pretty high powered affair that began with a very interesting garden party at the King of Sweden's palace overlooking the Volvo Ocean Race village and ended with me joining the King and Dr. Craig Venter (he mapped the human genome, its a big deal!) for lunch where I was given the job of explaining the Biomass project that we MCM's have been doing around the world.
Around 1900 water sampling tests have been undertaken by the MCM team as part of a study commissioned by the Wallenius Wilhelmson Logistics people, in partnership with Wallenius Water. It's a part of their initiative to track and prevent the spread of invasive species via ships' ballast water.
Anyway, no one told me that I would be sitting at the King's table for the luncheon let alone next to him and I rocked up in a t-shirt and jeans expecting to be eating with all the other students and lab technicians that were there to hear Dr. Venter speak.
As the race winds down it becomes an ever-increasing logistical nightmare trying to get your personal effects to the proper locations... without going into detail the basic problem was that all my clothes had to leave for St Petersburg two days before departure. This left me with
only a small bag of the basics, hopefully they'll be there waiting for me.
It's probably the best thing that I was unaware who I would be eating with. The King didn't seem to mind a bit and I had a nice time chatting with him about the race and what we could expect for the start off Sandham. I tried to get the inside track but I think deep down, he's rooting for the E3 boys.
As I mentioned at the top of the page, the week started with a nice welcome party at the Palace where I ended up talking to Amory Lovins, who is the chief scientist and founder of the "Rocky Mountain Institute", a US based think-tank that is well worth checking out. He seemed interested in the engineering aspects of our Volvo Open 70s - he very quickly wrapped his head around the whole thing and had some really thought-provoking ideas regarding the way we build and sail these
boats... It's fascinating to talk with someone super-smart who has no real agenda other than pure curiosity and an interest in science and the real world. He wrote a book that you can check out at www.oilendgame.com - I intend to read it when the race is over and I have a bit more time.
Probably sounds as though I'm a serial name dropper... sorry for that... it's just the vibe in Stockholm, a very sophisticated and classy place, super-clean and populated by the healthiest looking people I ever saw. Because of these chance meetings and my work throughout the race as an infrequent blogger for www.blueproject.org, I am starting to see some synergy and a small idea is developing for the next project...
Rick
Received 06:59 GMT