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In the giant sail loft on the top floor of Team New Zealand's Valencia headquarters, three sailmakers are clustered round a whiteboard. There's a list of what they have to do and some discussion about the last item - a new New Zealand flag measuring 14m by 7m.
There's a feeling in the camp that there's not much wrong with the existing flag, fluttering half heartedly outside in Valencia's light, fluky winds. But "Dalts" wants a new one, and what team chief Grant Dalton says, goes. The giant New Zealand flag, the biggest size that would fit on the flagpole, started a mine's-bigger-than-yours competition among the bases when it was first raised, with other syndicates soon trying to outdo the Kiwis with bigger versions of their own. Dalton's lost interest in that game. But he does want the existing one replaced. It's starting to fade and is a little tatty on one corner due to storm damage.
And it's the way things are done at the Team New Zealand base. The place is immaculate, not a scrap of rubbish lying around. Even the three-storey iron staircase which runs up the outside of the building is kept clean, scrubbed with soap and water by a Spanish woman on her knees.
It's a peculiar mix, this team base which is so far from home. Dalton has gathered around him a team of people he knows and trusts. Some are getting long in the tooth; they know just about everyone worth knowing.
Bob Peterson is on meet-and-greet at the Team New Zealand front door. With 25 years at TVNZ before moving to Australia two years ago, Peterson is a well-recognised face. When Prime Minister Helen Clark walked in he was on familiar enough ground to get away with a "kia ora girl," a kiss and a Peterson-sized grin. Nga Puhi and fluent in Maori, he says he's used his native tongue more in Valencia and Australia than he ever did in New Zealand. He and Dalton agreed on a handshake after the challenge was mounted that Peterson would be in Valencia.
At mid morning, the Team New Zealand base is quiet. Dalton wanders round with a mug of coffee, unshaven, dressed in his race gear but relaxed. He's not one for sitting in his office. He's constantly walking round the base, looking, talking, checking. They say he's tough, a hard taskmaster but it's said as fact rather than a complaint.
At nearly 50 Dalton's body is as toned and muscled as the young bucks'. In the mornings he might be greeting VIPs and sponsors as chief executive of Emirates Team New Zealand. In the afternoons, if there's racing, he'll be throwing his muscle into grinding on the black boat - sometimes for two races in a row. Back on the base, he'll have a beer with the crew or guests who each day pour off the three hospitality boats, including the luxurious 34-metre sloop Imagine owned by Swiss/Italian millionaire and Team New Zealand supporter Matteo de Nora.
Dalton exudes an air of confidence. There's no need for a stranger to ask who's in charge.
He is surrounded by goodwill, evident in millions of dollars worth of fixtures, fittings and equipment donated by New Zealand companies - everything from the coffee machine, door handles and clocks to carpet and plywood paneling for the walls. Over the three years, $25 million worth of products will have been donated by Kiwi companies. Team New Zealand's budget - "well over a million dollars," according to Dalton - is modest compared to the likes of Alinghi and BMW Oracle. And miniscule compared to the $820 million spent on Valencia's Port America's Cup.
Yet there's nothing home-grown about this show. With Emirates as a major sponsor, gleaming black limousines with leather upholstery and uniformed chauffeurs deliver guests to the doors of the base. Team New Zealand will have hosted its fair share of VIPs - racing driver Michael Schumacher, Jacque Rogge, president of the International Olympic Committee, round-the-world solo yachtswoman Ellen MacArthur, hot-air balloonist Bertrand Piccard - before it's all over.
Plenty more wealthy international names have quietly given large amounts of money, not expecting or wanting any public recognition.
But there's no doubt this is a Kiwi challenge. Over the door leading outside to the dock hangs a large Buzzy Bee. There's another stylized one, with a competitive glint in its eye, adorning the 20-tonne keel bulb on NZL84.
Covering a wall on the public side of the base is a giant New Zealand Post jigsaw puzzle signed by thousands of Kiwis and sent piece by piece to Valencia. The postage stamp shows a photo of the black boat under sail and the postmark circle reads "Let's bring it home New Zealand".
Look around the base and the generosity is everywhere. Outside is a $1 million crane capable of lifting 55 tonnes - a black boat weighs 24 tonnes - with a boom that extends enough to lift up the 33-metre boat mast. Wellington-based Titan Cranes bought the crane in Germany last year and had it delivered straight to the Team New Zealand base on loan until after the racing. The company has provided cranes to Team New Zealand since 1992.
General manager John Carter was on his way to a construction expo in Munich last week and diverted to Valencia for a spot of race watching from the deck of Imagine.
As sponsorship goes, he says, there's probably not a lot in it for Titan.
"We're not that sort of business that gains a lot out of sponsorship. It's more a support-New-Zealand thing and we've met some great people. Sir Peter Blake was the first one."
On board a couple of days later is Blake's widow Lady Pippa, who flew in from England where she spends much of her time as a professional artist. Trim and cheerful in skinny white jeans she says it's great to keep in touch with the team.
"I think the boys have done a great job." Yes, she agrees, Peter would be proud.
She, like others, has been invited to be 18th man but the lack of sailing means VIPs come and go without a race.
Racing or not, each day the shore crew and sailors go through the motions with the same discipline. By 10.30am the boys are hosing down NZL92 in its cradle and the straddle lift is standing by to gently lower it into the water.
Boat captain for NZL92, which has a keel bulb painted to look like a New Zealand flag being dragged through the water, is team grinder and former Olympic rower Rob Waddell.
This is his second America's Cup and, he says, he needed a new job, apart from his place as grinder, to keep him motivated.
"What a lot of people don't realise is that a huge amount of your time is spent on shore. So last time I was heavily involved with the installation and serving and maintenance of the winch systems."
Waddell oversees the day-to-day running of 92, making sure that it gets in and out of the water safely and that it is ready to race.
"Most of it is a fairly simple job but you are lifting 24 tonnes of boat everyday and there are some horrific examples of how that's gone bad for people in the past. There are simple mistakes you can make which would be catastrophic to a campaign.
"The thing I enjoy about that is that you don't look at your watch and say 'oh, it's five o'clock, I'm out of here'. You go home and you know everything is done properly. It has to be like that because otherwise when you are doing long days, you don't want it to feel like a job. You want it to feel like something you are really motivated to do."
Waddell says it's "awesome" having his family, wife and former Olympic rower Sonia and their three children, with him in Valencia.
The families and team live in a group of 90 apartments. The only time a team member is isolated is if a partner or child gets sick. Dalton can't afford to lose any sailors to illness - and with a strange new array of bugs in Valencia plenty of the children have been sick this year - so the crew member is moved into a hotel.
Every race day the wives, partners and children walk to Port America's Cup to wave the black boat off as it's towed out through a 600-metre man-made canal and out to sea.
If Team New Zealand is sailing the north course, right off Valencia's La Malvarrosa Beach, the boat departs at 12.30pm. But if it's the more distant south course the boat leaves an hour earlier.
Fifteen minutes before the boat departs, the base suddenly fills with women standing talking in the sun, pushing buggies, handing out plastic containers of cut-up fruit and drink bottles to youngsters.
Mostly they wave from the top of the three-storey base, set up with sun umbrellas and outdoor furniture - all donated.
When the black boat is towed back in, accompanied by the race boats, it's once again a team effort. Everyone from the team chef to the Kiwi skipper of Imagine are down at the dock to help heave heavy sails off the boat. Waddell's family are back to welcome him in. The giant grinder stands talking with his 22-month-old son Hayden suspended high in the air on the end of his father's outstretched arm. The toddler, squealing in delight, does not realise the sheer strength it takes to hold him up there, unwavering, for so long.
High above the sail loft, work goes on. Team New Zealand might have won a race today but sailmaking and repairs go on all day, and all night if necessary. It is here that spinnakers the size of two tennis courts and as long as the wing of a Boeing 747 are made. The sailmakers are busy making carbon and Kevlar moulded sails for the semi finals in May. And making plans for the new New Zealand flag "Dalts" wants made.
From here the view stretches across the water to Louis Vuitton's headquarters, the gleaming white Veles e Vents (Sails and Wind in Spanish) building. It alone cost $70 million to build, twice the budget to build the America's Cup village in Auckland. There on the outside covered decking on the first level are two silver trophies on display, the Louis Vuitton Cup and the coveted America's Cup trophy. Entry to the port, surrounded by a security fence, is free. So are the activities - interactive games, a miniature train which takes visitors round the six-kilometre perimeter, a ferry to take people across the canal and entertainment. In a long, shallow pool children can sail miniature versions of the America's Cup boats by remote control. The black boat was sitting on a supervisor's lap, undergoing repairs after an over-enthusiastic child sailed it into the side of the pool, the day the Herald on Sunday visited. And for older kids, wind buggies on wheels with a sheet (rope) to control the sail and a steering wheel.
Right now the port is quiet but as the weather warms and interest in the cup grows, it will fill with visitors and super yachts anchoring for the summer. Larry Ellison's 138-metre superyacht Rising Sun sits outside the port looking like a mini ocean liner. The gossip in the port is that even though Rising Sun can squeeze in, Ellison objected to the astronomical daily charge for berthage and elected to stay outside for free.
Tucked away on the south side of the port is Team New Zealand's base. The Kiwis got a good deal, and more space, for being the first to put their hand in the air for the unpopular south side. On the north side sits the money - Alinghi (Ernesto Bertarelli and Brad Butterworth) BMW Oracle (Larry Ellison and Chris Dickson) and Luna Rossa, funded by Prada.
Bertarelli and Ellison probably don't understand why Team New Zealand has an old wooden toy with a fierce expression painted on the keel of one of its boats. They need to be Kiwi to understand.
