The skull and crossbones will fly defiantly and a crew of pirates will be given the freedom of the seas off Vigo, in north-west Spain, tomorrow. A black moustachioed Cap'n Paul Cayard is back to try to win his second Volvo Ocean Race at the helm of The Black Pearl.
For the next seven months, racing more than 31,000 nautical miles, the 46-year-old Cayard will be at the helm of £10m of blue-water racing yacht, which Disney is using to promote the sequel to its 2003 Hollywood blockbuster, Pirates of the Caribbean, to be released next summer.
"I like the pirate theme," said Cayard, who lives near San Francisco and in 1998 became the first American skipper to win what was then called the Whitbread Round the World Race. "I think it will be huge with the non-sailing public. I haven't gotten into the corny aspects of it, but even my wife thinks I should get a Black Pearl earring."
The Black Pearl has Dead Man's Chest graphics on the sails and the hull is painted to give a hint of a monster that will be revealed in the film. Dead Man's Chest is scheduled to be released on 7 July, so the sail number is 7706.
In some cases, common sense won out over publicity. Original plans called for black sails, but the crew pointed out that if they hoisted a black spinnaker in the middle of the night they would not be able to see if it was set properly.
"We're fully into it, but we're not changing who we are. We're still professional sailors," Cayard said.
Disney is the only American entry in the seven boat, nine-leg round-the-world race in which only the hardiest and most experienced yatchsmen participate. The skippers and their nine-man crews will be wet, cold, tired and living on freeze-dried food for weeks. Then there is the Southern Ocean, with its ferocious storms and fearsome icebergs.
The danger this year is increased because the race is introducing the first generation of a largely untested but powerful breed of 70ft yachts, which will be tested to the limit. The fleet set off on the opening 6,400 mile leg to Cape Town tomorrow, but few would bet on all seven going through the finish line in Gothenburg in June. On the way they visit Melbourne, Wellington, Rio de Janeiro, Baltimore, New York, Portsmouth and Rotterdam.
If forecasts come true, the weather at the start should see them catapulted out of the blocks so fast that the world record, set by the Spanish entry Movistar, of 530 miles in 24 hours could be broken in the first days.
Life at the extreme is how the event, which has been staged every four years since 1973, has chosen to describe itself. Driving these million pound boats in gale-force winds may be less physical than their predecessors, but maximum concentration is required when huge, 40-foot waves pick them up for surf ride after surf ride.
The boats, half the weight but carrying as much sailpower as America's Cup yachts which are 10 feet longer, are breathtakingly quicker and, while the Cup yachts have a crew of 17, the Volvo yachts have cut the crew from 12 last time to 10.
While there has been little focus on the potential for masts breaking, even though they use man-made fibre rather than steel rigging to hold them up, the introduction of swinging keel mechanisms, which can move the whole keel structure from side to side to help sit the boats up, has had everyone frowning.
Movistar alone has spent nearly £300,000 on development and testing of the hydraulic rams. But the management insists that, while failure might be race-threatening, it should not be life-threatening.
