This weekend was boat boat boat!

On Saturday we headed down to see Justin at the SeaSabre workshop to get some of the final things fitted on the boat. Liferaft straps, Jetboil holder, new (longer) seat rails, and various other straps and attachments all went in. Only a couple more bits and pieces to go on in Monterey (plus a lot of food and kit), and she’ll be ready to go!

Sunday was a water day. Battling an unusually low tide near Padstow, we made it out with both boats and everyone still intact, though rather wet. I got some rowing training in while some super clever friends in the other boat managed to do some aerial filming of the boat using a GoPro attached to a hexacopter. Scroll right down to the bottom of the page for the video.

It’s really great to be starting to get a feel for the boat now – I can’t wait to get out there!

It was scarier than I thought it would be to be stuck hanging upside-down inside the cabin, with green water lapping at the hatches, creaks and groans coming from the boat, simply waiting for it to self-right again.

With BBC Points West looking on, we capsized the boat three times in Bristol Harbour with the help of Andy and his wonderful team of volunteers on MShed’s crane, as well as the Harbourmaster’s boat.

The first attempt was just to see what would happen if we capsized the empty, unballasted boat in flat water. She lay very comfortably upside-down, making no attempt to self-right.

Secondly, I got into the cabin and strapped into my harness to be capsized – again unballasted. The boat was more unstable, but still wouldn’t self-right, even after a good four minutes of struggling.

Third time lucky – we put 50kg of coal into the boat as ballast (the only thing we had to hand that was heavy enough), strapped me inside again, and capsized her. Almost immediately, she came round again.

Conclusion: ballast is very important if you don’t want to be trapped upside-down in your cabin in the middle of the Pacific!

BBC Points West coverage of the tests (with apologies to every other European crew at the end there!)

When I was speaking at the Winter School Games, I met Councillor Alan McMurray of North Somerset Council. He was really interested in my row, and invited me to speak at a Civic Lunch celebrating community sport in North Somerset. I was pretty chuffed to be speaking alongside an Olympian and a Great Britain gymnastics champion.

It was a lovely event – despite feeling exhausted from being out training with the boat the night before – and there were some great questions from the audience.

I had the boat with me, so we positioned it outside the hotel so that people could have a look at it afterwards. It made quite an impression!