Andrea Nemetz, 43, had limited experience of sailing in small boats and schooners before embarking on the three-week Clipper Training programme to prepare her for the challenge of crewing a 68-foot ocean racing yacht across the largest expanse of water in the world.

Having completed her compulsory training at Clipper’s south coast base in the UK, Andrea has now joined her team mates to set sail from Qingdao, China, on the seventh of the 14 individual races that make up the Clipper 07-08 Round the World Yacht Race. The only professional sailor on board Nova Scotia is skipper Rob McInally. The international crew, including eight other Canadians, are non-professional sailors and many of them had never set foot on board a yacht before beginning the comprehensive training programme that would set them on their way to becoming skilled and experienced yachtsmen and women.

The trans-Pacific crossing to Honolulu in Hawaii, USA, began on Sunday in near-freezing temperatures with heavy snow during the first night at sea and will take approximately three and a half weeks, both of which Andrea admits will be tough for her. “The cold on this leg is going to be one of the hardest parts,” she says. “It’s also a very long time on a boat for someone with minimal sailing experience.”

But, she says, she is really looking forward to “the sense of adventure, seeing new places and meeting new people, learning new skills and competing as a team.”

“I live in Halifax, surrounded by water and boats and whenever the Tall Ships came to town I’d think about sailing away,” says Andrea, who has taken time out from her job as a journalist to take part in the race, “but I really wanted to join the Clipper Round the World Yacht Race because of the team aspect and competing against other boats.”

As she arrived in Qingdao to join her crew mates in the Olympic Sailing Centre Andrea said, "It's really exciting to take part in this race and to be on Nova Scotia. I didn't realise how excited I would be until I arrived and saw all the tartan on the boat. It's really exciting to be able to tell people about my home province."

Nova Scotia is one of ten identical internationally-backed 68-foot yachts taking part in the Clipper 07-08 Race. Each is crewed by up to 17 people from all walks of life who are led by a professional skipper. Clipper 07-08 is divided into 14 individual races for which the teams earn points and the one with the most when the fleet arrives in Liverpool on 5 July at the end of the 35,000-mile race around the world will be awarded the Clipper Trophy. The fleet will visit 12 countries during the ten-month race and will pull in to Nova Scotia in June when the teams will enjoy the Province’s world-renowned hospitality in both the capital, Halifax, and Sydney, Cape Breton Island.

It won’t be the first time that the Clipper Race has visited Nova Scotia, although it will be the first planned visit. In the Clipper 2002 Round the World Yacht Race, the eight teams were diverted to Halifax to dodge a hurricane.

Supporters of Nova Scotia can follow Andrea and her team mates’ progress on the Race Viewer at www.clipperroundtheworld.com, where the yachts’ positions are updated every six hours and blogs, videos and photos sent back by the crew are posted.

Established in 1996, this is the sixth Clipper Round the World Yacht Race. It is the brainchild of legendary yachtsman, Sir Robin Knox-Johnston, the first man to sail solo and non-stop around the world. He wanted ordinary people to be able to experience the sheer exhilaration of ocean racing which, until then, had been the preserve of the rich or professionals.

Clipper Chairman and renowned solo yachtsman Sir Robin Knox-Johnston said, “Everyone who takes part in the Clipper Race has their own reason for doing so; some to experience the adrenaline rush that comes with taking on nature in the raw, some to push themselves further than they thought possible and others to compete in the largest global yacht race in the world.”

Sir Robin says, “Andrea will be joining more than 1,400 people who have made the Clipper experience a turning point in their lives. We want people to finish the race thinking that it’s the best thing they have ever done. You could join these people.” He adds that anyone over the age of 18 can enter – and there is no upper age limit. Competitors taking part, 40 percent of whom had no sailing experience before signing up, include a vicar, a farmer, a taxi driver, a stockbroker, a barrister, a housewife and a postman.

Andrea says, “If an inexperienced person like me can do it, you can too!”

Berths are now available for the Clipper 09-10 Round the World Yacht Race. For more information on applying to become a crew member, contact Clipper Ventures on +44 (0) 2392 526000 oremail clipperroundtheworld.com.

ENDS

For further information log onto www.clipperroundtheworld.com