Daily Logs

Hassebas - Log 4 Spaanse Vissersboot

Vierde Verslag Hassebas"Verslag 4: de Hassebas zet een tandje bij"DankDank voor de vele aanmoedigende reactiesdie wij via Julia ontvingen.Op verzoek van de Nederlandse kinderen schrijven we vandaag eens in het Nederlands.De Boter begint te is smelten- 20ste breedte graadHet advies van de visser uit Las Palmasblijkt volledig correct te zijn. Zodra de boter begon smelten nam de speed van Hassebas toe ,tot nog niet eerder gerealiseerde snelheden. De boter smolt, de koers werd naar West ingezet, de blauwe genaker werd gehesen om er niet meer van af te komen.De crew was na 3 trainingsrondjes warmgedraaid, was het gezeur met roerbladen en kapotte zeilen te boven en besloot dat het hoog tijd was een tandje bij te zetten. Het is toch leuker om alvast een paar keer om Virgin Islands heen te varen. read more...

Hassebas - Log 3

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Engelen - Day 11 - Maybe a personal recordfor Engelen?

The day began nice and sunny with modest wind and few waves. After our halfway celebrations beer right after dinner we put in one reef in the mainsail just for precaution as the wind picked up during the night before. At about 1 am we had to put a 2nd reef into the main sail due to the increasing wind. After 3 exhausting night shifts during which neither of us could get sleep because the ship was moving around. We are all exhausted. At least Andi is asleep right now in his berth. Roel is on the wheel and Mat is doing the dishes of our breakfast -scrambled eggs with bacon.Our perishable food is almost gone by now. We have some oranges, some bananas and two cabbages left. For the upcoming days our menu will contain a lot of pasta as I guess.Today we recognized that we made some good miles. read more...

Cosmic Dancer V - Days 9 & 10 - Trade wind sailing ?

Trade wind sailing - the term conjures up images of yachts bounding along in near perfect sailing conditions, clear blue skies, and totally predictable winds and weather for weeks on end - or at least that was the image we had when we signed up for what was billed as the ultimate long distance trade wind sailing experience - ARC 2011!!With the pre ARC newsletters that arrived through the letterbox, came a few gentle hints that just occasionally this sailing bliss might be interrupted by the "odd tropical squall" passing through, but that these could almost always be detected in advance on radar and often avoided. Any thoughts about "We don't have radar - should we fit one before doing the ARC?" are dismissed the moment the next letter is opened - the bank statement which tells you in no. read more...

Raparee - Halfway day (and night): Raparee's corkscrewing sleigh ride.

31st Nov & AM 1st Dec: Raparee - mid Atlanic.Raparee's halfway day yesterday went by quietly with little time for whooping it up. Nicks home-baked olive bread was twoderful and a sight to behold.Wind is a fluky 25 knots and we had 2 or 3 gybes as the swell knocks us around. All sails are preventered so no major dramas. David achieves a burst of 10 knots although our average is 7 or 8. By early afternoon, we have a further chain of gybes caused by the autohelm not responding. Major problem as we depend heavily on him (sic) for downwind sailing with one watchkeeper sailing. Skipper goes ino the bowels of the ship, heart in mouth. Commands in the cockpit give no response at the ram below. Panic. Handsteering for a hour or so while skipper rubs his remaining neurons together.. read more...

Whippersnapper - Day 11

Photo is Mike showing his navigational expertise on our Atlantic passage chart (a purist would never mark chart in pen Mike! Otherwise I don't feel like writing much about the day, firstly because I baked some bread which wasn't great (first time and I don't think I'll repeat the messy exercise), secondly because Mike and I spent the better part of the day unblocking the forward head… lovely. Last night though we did get our first taste of Atlantic squalls, only 30kts but with full white sails it was enough to make it scary on solo night watches. We bent a second stanchion when the auto pilot took us into a crash gybe and the preventer leant heavily on it (starting to accumulate a little list of repairs/replacements for St Lucia). Right now we're rocketing along in 25-30kts winds. read more...

Whippersnapper - Day 10

Thrilled to see our ranking has improved so much, we're now 81st which is even better placed than we were after the first day. This is a corrected ranking that takes into account our handicap, so essentially it just means we're sailing better than average for our boat, still we're happy though. Alternatively on uncorrected time we're 112th overall or 7th within our class. We caught a small Marlin today (see photo), he was a beautiful fish and while he may have fed us we couldn't bring ourselves to cut him up so after a quick photo shoot we sent him back for a hopeful exchange with his bigger brother. We also had another big bite in the morning that snapped a hook, we either seem to catch things too small or way too big! Banana week is still going but it's starting to drag on a. read more...

Annie - Log Day 12 by Peter

Please note: after writing this blog our engine failed to start. We run the engine everyday in neutral to recharge the batteries. We do have a back-up which is water towed but not nearly as efficient. If you don't hear from us for a while it is because we are saving energy for more vital functions. We are not in any difficulty.Curious Incidents Involving Assults to the Ears in the Middle of the NightI'm sure you can picture the scene, it's 0300 hrs and I'm on watch, my head wedged between a winch drum and the companion way canopy, because after all that's the most comfortable place to put it. The endless rolling of the seas, the dark waves rising ocassionally into white fringed breakers, no moon and the only sounds the creaking of the rig and the swash of our bow wave as it fizzes down. read more...

One Hull - Ned's Blog 01/12/11

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Jacana of Ardmay - 30/11/11

Hi Everyone,   The day started off very well with lovely sunny weather and good trade winds that are continuing to push us nicely across to St Lucia, just before 11 am today we reached half way and have something like 1,400 miles to go, should be in St Lucia in time for Lucy and Nicks arrival and Fred will be at ease that his credit card will not be abused! Today we had two happy hours, one with some Moet to celebrate crossing the half way mark and the other for St Andrews Day so we had some Haggis, Sweet Potato and Tatties very tasty too and the boys had a wee dram! Andrew and Andrew tried to fish today, unfortunately not successful as we were sailing too fast and the lure was just having a wee water ski behind us. Fred and I on watch 6 to 9 pm and the weather turned all Scottish. read more...

Eleanda - Day 11

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Aztec Dream - 01/12/11 - Halfway haggis...

Yesterday morning we reached halfway, the point of no return, and finally feel like we're in the Trade Winds as the breeze has picked up to a constant 20-25 knots. This makes for some great sailing but is not very conducive to sleeping with the rolling motion actually worsening. It always seems to be a bit calmer and quieter in the late afternoon, lulling everyone into a false sense of security. Forget katabatic winds, Mistrals and Meltimis.....come 18.00 the 'Dinner wind' sets in, kicking up an extraordinary violent motion that coincides with the serving of dinner.We had a very pleasant day in the sunshine, celebrating St. Andrews Day at lunchtime with some excellent MacSween haggis (thank you Sandy & Beth for smuggling into Las Palmas), a tot of whisky and the pipes playing. read more...

Mojomo - Outside Lane again

19:08N 39:38W at 0640 GMT wind 5-6 in squalls dead astern overnight, COG 260 direct at St Lucia wpt SOG 8-9, surfing to 17knots max tonite 18.4 but stalling at 6ish...Mr Pink still wafting about ahead, 5ish metres side to side and over 8 metres above the deck, dragging us all along at an average 8.7 knots over the past 24hrs according to the ARC info we got this morning.Quick eh? On the foredeck, the speed feels fine: there’s no hint of a broach - we have no mainsail up (which would risk a bad stuff, driving the boat downwards from behind instead of like now - always pulling it upwards from ahead) - and we’re well within the 20kt AWS design speed of the sail.The sea is only around 3m dead behind us - I've sailed this sort of rig in over 5m sea. Dyneema guy ropes and new. read more...

Challenger 4 - Day 11 - 1st December 2011

Day 11 - 1st December 2011As each day passes the real star of the show - the ship - shows her true colours. With apologies to the Bard. "All this world is a ship and its crew are merely actors - each with their entrances and exits." Never has such words had as much resonance as on this little ship. The director of our play is our enormously experienced skipper ably assisted by the mates who together choreograph the various scenes - each intertwining our individual parts into a coherent masterpiece!. As such sometimes our rehearsals are farcical, others tragic but the director assures us its all part of the learning process.By day the routine of steering toward our goal is marked by the log slowly marking our miles passage. Little disturbs the mind as the scenery slowly changes marked by. read more...

La Palapa - Another great sunset .. 30 Nov 1550 nm to St Lucia

today we decided to roll back the time an hour to try to sync up sun set and sunrise with palapa time. we settled on 730 am sunrise and 630pm sunset. this gave us an extra hour for "activities" today. we started with the breakfast activity aimee made us each individual omelets mine apparently ended up with all the egg yolks very good! we (ie aimee) finished off the leach line stitching on the main so all we have left is some reinforcing on the clue but our sewing awl is getting a bit dull and the last part is the thickest with multiple layers. the goal is to get everything together in the next couple of days so we are ready if and when the wind dies on the 4th or 5th.the sailing has been going amazingly well, perfect wind 15 to 25 behind us making 6 kts have not had the engine on in. read more...

Meltemi -11.Tag

Nach vielen schoenen Tagen und lauen Naechten beginnt der Atlantik sein zweites Gesicht zu zeigen.. Aktuell pfluegen wir bei 6-8 Windstärken und Kreuzssee durch die Nacht, immer wieder durchgeschuettelt von schweren, unsichtbar im Dunkeln anrollenden Wellen. Unsere eigentliche Sorge gilt jedoch "Squallis", das sind hohe Turmwolken (aehnlich wie bei Gewitter), die sich in instabiler Luftschichtung bilden und viel Regen und Wind mit sich bringen. Alle paar Minuten wird deshalb das Radarbild nach diesen "ungebetenen Gaesten" geprueft - noch hatten wir diese Nacht Glueck und sie zogen entweder backbords oder steuerbords an uns vorbei. Aber die naechste Squalli steht bereits vier Meilen quer an Steuerbord und laeuft schneller als wir - hoffentlich bleibt sie auf Parallelkurs. Ansonsten war. read more...

Angerona - Blog, day 10, by Gro

To day we have been celebrating with a little "aquavit" for lunch! We are now halfway the distance to St. Lucia! The life on board is great, and we have the best crew! The temperature lies between 23-27 degrees Celcius in the air, and 32 in the water.  The weather is mainly sunny with a few clouds. We have got some raindrops the last days, but the rain lasts only for some minutes. To day we experienced the first squall.  Not very funny,- the water from the pasta pan was not in the pan anymore! But, the crew did their job, and reefed the sails very nicely! Until now, we have had a relative good trading wind. For a while, we have stopped fishing.  We have got  many gold mackerels, and we cant eat fish for dinner and lunch every day. We are hoisting the sails in the. read more...

Casamara - Day 11

Hi everyone,   No too much to report today.  we have been on same tack all day and creaming along.  We constantly supervise chafe and so far so good - fingers crossed.   We run three watches:   Watch 1- Iain (first mate) and Julian the brave chef.  Iain is also chief technical officer and fixes things as we go along.  Julian has prepared feasts as we go along.   Watch 2 - Paul (watch leader) and Tim.  Paul (the father of the house) is easily the most experienced yachtsman on board and nothing phases him.  Tim is chief entertainment officer in charge of humor films and sundowners.   Watch 3 - Simon (Skipper) and Charles - Charles is the most active with his course refining, squeezing every last ounce of speed out of Casamara.  . read more...

Voahangy - Day 11 - Fish Tartare

Today was a quiet day on board: we are still doing good speed, pushed along by 18-25knots tradewinds, so are other yachts judging by the daily position report, but we have not been in visual contact with any for 3 days, It is a big ocean out here!After yesterday's busy morning attending to a broken handrail which snapped when the headsail sheet got caught underneath (a design problem in our opinion, there is a gap between the end of the rail and the superstucture, of course a line will be caught in there!), Marc's fishing efforts were rewarded in the afternoon with another mahi- mahi,1,10mt long, nearly as big as the first one. At the risk of sounding spoiled, I must say we are reaching saturation with fish dinners, and after keeping enough for one last feast of fish and chips tonight,. read more...

Cheeki Rafiki - Day 11

Wildlife day.   A pod of dolphins joined us at lunch time, swimming alongside us for about 15 minutes. Several of them were showing off, jumping out of the water and they seemed to respond to our cheering. A couple of hours later a whale joined us. It swam alongside us for some time checking our both the yacht and the fishing line we were trawling. Like the dolphins he swam with us for some time. I don't think any of us realised how fast a whale could swim.   Doug Innes Skipper Cheeki Rafiki / Stormforce Coaching  . read more...

Cheeki Rafiki - Day 11 From Ivan STAROSTIN. First contact

From Ivan STAROSTIN.   First contact. DAY 11.   Ahoy all those who were wise enough to stay onshore.   Sitting here in a roller-coaster boat, in 3.5 meters waves, with skippers legs sticking out from the berth into my face,  Parma ham leg swinging from the ceiling of the saloon, I've realised that fulfilling the dream takes a man, and its not an easy ride.   Boat rolling from side to side 24/7 brings your thoughts into similar motion as well. Repetitive horror dreams about work were terrifying me for the first 6 nights. It took me a bit longer to reach Zen mind state than I initially anticipated. But countless stars at night watches, acid-pink dusk skies, virgin light lines of dawn and breathing. read more...

Island Wanderer - Tea bag crisis 16.18N 40.08W

After a recent tea bag audit, it has come to light that the PG tips will run out in approximately 4 days. Earl Grey, chamomile, vanilla and caramel, peppermint and Moroccan tea will last the journey. Mandy is quietly confidant the PG tips can be made to last and is pegging out used tea bags to dry on the rails for re use. Derek said he’d be happy to swap to Gin and Tonic. Doug was unavailable for comment. Pete only drinks ovaltine and thinks the whole affair is a storm in a tea cup. Avril only drinks Earl Grey, chamomile, vanilla and caramel, peppermint and Moroccan tea.   Other news: Derek was hoisted up the mast in an attempt to uncurl the top 6 inches of the main, which became twisted when yesterdays dorado was landed. Unfortunately he was unable to take the twist out, but. read more...

Sookie - Day 11 (Nine) The one that got away

All hands on deck 0800 (just after sun up) after a very comfortable night's sleep.   We hoisted the repaired cruising Genoa followed by the cruising chute.  All done by 0900.  Another sailing boat was spotted at 0600 this morning  and we passed very close to it at about 0720.  I think the boat was Annie.  If it was hi to Graham (nice chap) and his crew, if it wasn't hi anyhow and safe journey.   As the lure situation is diminishes homemade is becoming the plan.  Jerry the seamstress ( great sewing job on the genoa) had his eye on a a peice of chord covered in red electrical tape a few days ago and intimated he would make his own red chilli lure which is just what it looked like.  However another shipmate got to it first adapted. read more...

Scarlet Oyster - Champagne Supernova 30/11/11

Evening All,Sorry for lack of blog last night, was getting a little feisty on the steering with some awkward waves and gusts of touching 30knots (not to mention 12knots at other times...)Again we have had another 2 days of great sailing, making further extensions on our class, we are looking ahead to the final route to the finish and are trying to set ourselves up to get through a light patch in a few days time.Every new weather file seems to paint another picture as to the best solution, with Vaquita in 'stealth mode' we are only seeing her position once a day, so cannot fully see what she is doing. For the last couple of days Clem has enjoyed better pressure and angle, and has been launched averaging 9.5knots VMG, we have been about 1 knot slower, so have lost a few miles to her.. read more...

Brizo - WCC Log Day 11 – Tuesday 30th Nov: No News is Good News (Stuart)

Today has been quiet after all the excitement of the past two days, what with the weather forecast, Spinnaker and Fish.  We have 3 days of fish for the four of us, well 2 now as we had our first helping of Wahoo last night. Pam also prepared a trial raw Polynesian starter of Wahoo for today and as she said, I was a bit sceptical – but we tested it and it is delicious. Yesterdays was cooked in the  steam oven (brilliant for fish and veg) the texture was like Monkfish whereas the raw version had very white meat after preparation but a much lighter delicate texture. Wahoo apparently like similar fish such as Barracuda will also grill as a steak. It’s a bit rocky to use the BBQ grill off the back at the moment which can result in no dinner at all in certain conditions. read more...

Watergaw - DAY 11 - 30/11/11 - St Andrew's Day

DAY 11 – Wednesday 30/11/11 – St Andrews’ Day This will be a short log submission today, as we have been sailing hard whilst the going is good. We had a grand day yesterday, and expect to find today’s run to be just as pleasing. The weather is expected to be reasonably similar for a couple of days before the wind abates towards the weekend. The further we are south and west, the more likely we are to minimise the effect on our passage time. So, heads down and gloves on…. Wildlife Watch We seem to have lost the dolphins, with no sightings over the last few days – must be away celebrating somewhere! There are plenty of flying fish, which take off in small flocks, presumably when they are being chased by something hungry. A flying fish’s life is. read more...

Kantara - Wild and windy night

Last night we celebrated our halfway point in the Journey ( 1450 N miles to St Lucia ) we had champagne and red wine with our salt  fish Baccalau . Followed by a bar of lime and sea salt chocolate for desert ( There was a salt theme in case you didn't notice ) We had a very pleasant evening ,drinking and chatting. The moon was up as were Jupiter, Venus and Mars.There was a good 16knots of  Easterly wind blowing us westward towards St Lucia, We all retired to bed about 10pm leaving Jason and Mike on watch. At about 2AM al hell broke loose . Kantara was hit by a sudden squall, the wind backed to the south and the wind speed hit 35knots. It took 10 minutes to reef the sails and get the her under control , At one stage Kantara was being blown backwards by the force of the. read more...

Ninfea - Daily Log

.hmmessage P { PADDING-BOTTOM: 0px; MARGIN: 0px; PADDING-LEFT: 0px; PADDING-RIGHT: 0px; PADDING-TOP: 0px } BODY.hmmessage { FONT-FAMILY: Tahoma; FONT-SIZE: 10pt } Ninfea daily log – November 30 Ten days at sea- And fishing and more fishingWe continue to fish with success for the sport and for the larder. Yesterday we caught a sailfish, a beautiful animal with a purple fin that extended at least 30-40 cm. Not very big, but how beautiful! We duly released it and invite anyone catching one to put it back. These wonderful fish are getting rare and should be protected. Today we got four dorados, all significantly larger than the previous ones (about ten). One of them is over 15 lbs. Plenty of meat for tonight’s sushi and tomorrow’s lunch. As they get bigger is harder and. read more...

Arabella - 30 Nov from Judith

Hi All  Just spoken with Arabella and they want to let everybody know they are all fine and making steady progress. Winds are currently blowing between 14 and 20 knots with plenty of warm sunshine and they should be half way by Thursday 1 Dec.   They have settled into a routine and say the days are passing quickly, by the time they all complete their jobs there little time for a snooze! but are managing to get in a happy hour each evening.   Regards Judith        . read more...

Ensemble - Day 11: 30 Nov 2011: Half Way!

Greetings from yacht Ensemble.We have now reached halfway - with only 1200 nautical miles to go!We decided to celebrate by cracking the 'Jamon' and a bottle of bubbly.Today the weather has been great and we have made good speed - with speeds up to 15 knots on breezes of 25 knots and a 2m swell in a following sea - and with just the parasail up. We still haven't needed to use the engine at all.The downside is we're moving a bit too fast for trolling - so the fish get another day of respite - except for the daily flying fish on the deck in the morning.Last night was interesting - when for no apparent reason all the lights and instruments went out (including the auto-pilot). Fortunately it was just a breaker that had gone and took no time for Magali to jump into the engine room to fix - but. read more...

Hanami II - Half way!

Well, we are half way there, so celibrations tonight!   Missed yesterday's blog, so to catch up on menus, we have had craqb salad with advacado and asparagus followed by creammy chicken curry, and last night we had lamb chops, lentils and potatoes ... the gravy was a mistake  on boat:-(   Continuing to make good progress, but reefing at night as much to stop us hoving to when the swell causes the main to back.  Expecting 27 knots plus gusts tonight, quite similar to most nights.  We are still sailing under main and poled out genoa.   Barry is behaving perfectly, but sometimes gets a bit confused with a big swell and gust at the same time.   Written by: David Holmes Crew: Hanami  II 30th November 2011. read more...

Skiathos - daily log SKIATHOS

Liebe Leser,   die Party geht weiter: gestern abend haben wir die berechnete Hälfte der Reise hinter uns gebracht, auch der 20. Breitengrad ist gequert, noch heute werden wir den 40. Längengrad überqueren und befinden uns damit bereits nördlich des brasilianischen Festlandes und quasi im direkten Anflug auf Saint Lucia. Jetzt hat uns der Passatwind voll im Griff und es läuft und läuft. Natürlich ist die Prognose der Ankunftszeit noch etwas verfrüht, aber es sieht so aus, als wäre die Atlantiküberfahrt nach 18 Tagen vollbracht. Würden wir mit der momentanen Geschwindigkeit weiterlaufen, so ist theoretisch sogar eine Ankunft am nächsten Mittwoch möglich. Wir werden es sehen... freuen tun wir uns aber jetzt schon:. read more...

Grateful Red - day ten

Over half way - in 1492 Mr. columbus left the canaries on september 9th and sailed until october 12th and landed San Salvador Island in the Bahamas. 33 days at sea with three boats and a crew of about 120 ..... always wondering if the earth's end was about to appear and they would be off the end. Wonder how morale was on day 32. With ten or maybe less days left on our crossing - morale is high. Popcorn and beers for dinner,moon waxing nicely in the east with a double reefed main expecting higher winds tonight.Sailing can't get much better.Ken. read more...

Matilda - Half Way Party

We've just had our half-way celebration involving a G&T or two and a nice big cigar for me. Mike cooked up an amazing dinner with a distinctly Caribbean flavour, so we're all in great spirits for the remaining 1,450 miles to go.We had a call from another ARC yacht which has been trying to catch us all day apparently, and their sails are just disappearing over the horizon to our stern, so everything is going very well indeed.Thanks to all who have been sending us emails; it's great to hear from you all the way out here in the middle of the Atlantic!We have our night rig up now, and we're settling down for another roster of night duty for each of us. We had caught some jetsam on our Duogen (a water-powered generator we drag behind the boat to generate electricity)which had fouled the. read more...

Twelve Moons - Report

gestern feierten wir 'Bergfest', das Erreichen der halben Distanz. Und heute sind wir bereist unter 1.000 Meilen zum Ziel. Die Stimmung ist gut, es riecht nach Karibik. Vor uns liegen drei vermutlich gleiche Tage mit gutem Vorankommen. Doch kurz vor der Inselwelt erwartet uns vermutlich eine schwierige Wettersituation mit voraussichtlich ganz ganz ganz wenig Wind. Wir wissen noch nicht, wie sich die Situation weiterentwickelt. Die Prognosen ändern sich laufend. Deshalb lassen wir es ein wenig auf uns zukommen, erarbeiten aber Strategien zur Umfahrung der windfreien Zone. Aus den Meldungen der anderen Schiffe hören wir, dass viele andere Boote mit großen Schäden kämpfen. Ausgebrochene Spiführungen im Mast, reihenweise zerstörte Segel, in die. read more...

Great Escape of Southampton - Day 11

Dear readers, the cat is out of the bag.  As First Mate is my duty to assess the crew for any weaknesses and report the blunt truth to the skipper.  I am going to be very unpopular for sharing my findings with you but I will have to live with that and be truthful.  I regret to inform you that YOUR husband, partner, father, son, friend, relative or colleague can indeed cook, clean, tidy up, wash clothes, find food in the fridge and at times show consideration to others. He even shows restraint with regards to alcohol.  I know this man is not the one you recognise but strange things happen at sea. With luck he may return to normal once back amongst you. Big day too yesterday – half way! Yay! We celebrated with two (small) glasses of coolish Cava and a platter of. read more...

Elphin II - Day 10 up date

Well here we go again in increasing rolling seas I will try to make some sensibly comments.   From the sailing point of view the strategy holds good with us moving ever up the field, but please don't expect this to continue much longer, when the fleet nears St Lucia then we will all have the same wind patterns unless something changes over the next few days. That is the one thing that continually changes the wind direction so always needing to trim sales etc. Yesterday was relatively quiet despite a jib sheet breaking at 1.30 am so repairs are needed later today. In raising the spinnaker this morning George was hit by gust of wind which sent him six feet in the air with resultant rope burns to fingers etc. First aid administered and I'm sure in a couple of days time he. read more...

Northern Child - Daily log #10 - 30th November

Daily Run towards St Lucia - 162nmDaily Logged Miles - 180nmDistance to Go - 1065nmLunch -Pasta Carbonara Happy Hour - Rioja with Chorizo Pate on ToastDinner - Meat BallsWind - 20 knots from the ENESailing can conjure up such romantic images:" I must go down to the seas again to the lonely sea and the sky, and all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by..." Be careful what you wish for because when the generator stops working and the main engine fails to start there's trouble ahead.... and you might just need the stars to steer by..." SabaAt 0600 after watch change, I tried starting the generator and then the engine, but both failed to start. The 12v battery bank used to start the generator and the engine were indicating an 11.3 voltage (empty). The starter batteries were totally. read more...

Diamonds Are Forever - blog - Day 10 - 29/11 - Venezuela here we come!

Diamonds blog - Day 10 - 29/11/11 - Venezuela here we come!?!Hi all!Greetings from the good ship Diamonds, we are making smashing progress today - flying along under reefed main and poled out headsail in fresh tail winds - so far we have clocked up a daily run of 151 miles and a top speed of 15.3 knots surfing down a wave (our speedo is slightly optimistic at high speeds, but lets ignore that for the moment!). We are averaging 7 knots at the moment which is great!This morning we reached our 1600nm to go to St Lucia and so by tomorrow we shall be celebrating our half way point! I won't spoil the plans for that just yet. Last night we celebrated the 20N30W waypoint and opened the box of lint chocolates given to us by Sailody - wow they were amazing! We also played a round of charades - old. read more...

Sibilation - Day 10

Noon to noon run = 156nm   A special moment occurred last night at 19.30 – the GPS read distance travelled and distance to go as the same (1433nm) so we celebrated a halfway point! It’ll be interesting to see what the total mileage ends up being. Our celebration consisted of a tin of peaches – rock n roll!! Also at the end of my watch we completed another 500nm milestone – so 1500nm in total.   As we’re mentioning records (and may regret mentioning this as don’t want to scare the parents) we surfed down a wave at 10.4kn today! Our friends on Tur-bo claim to have got 12.2 though!  I (Hannah) am now record holder for distance travelled on watch and speed! I think Nick and Jeff’s competitiveness is having an effect on me!   The. read more...

Nyda - Day 11: Resume so far

So.. We have been at sea for 11 days now having left Las Palmas on November 20th. It was to the accompaniment of Pontoon R's resident musician (John from Chiscos) on the trumpet (playing Waltzing Matilda) that we slipped our lines. We have failed dismally so far in updating our log since then so this is a rundown of our highs and lows so far:Great start as we crossed the line on starboard tack approx 1 minute after the gun, gybing on the pin. We did consider forcing the rest of the fleet to gybe but thought better of upsetting 200 or so boats at the beginning of a 2800 mile journey!Day 2 remarkable only for lack of wind, forcing us to get the motor running for a couple of hours. V dull......Day 3 Ooops! Disaster struck with me (Rosie) on the helm whilst Dad (Geoff) was on the daily radio. read more...

Vivi - Log day 1- 10, Life on board Yacht Vivi

Life on board Yacht Vivi   Skipper – Maurice Weddell, Crew – Natalie Flageul, Peter Weddell, Grey Warne and John Denton   Day One Departed from Las Palmas marina at 11.50, five minutes before the start of the cruising division we switched off the engine and pulled up the main and front sails.At 13.00 the maroon was blasted and we were off...Started well with good winds carrying us with the rest of the fleet. One of the crew members had a bout of sea sickness as the boat begun it course. First night shift of the rally saw clear skies and enabled us to do a bit of planet spotting with Venus and Jupiter out on show.   Day Two – Day Seven Somewhere between Gran Canaria and Cape Verde islands, heading south/south west with nice sunshine with a little cloud. We. read more...

Cochise - 30/11/11

Day 11 Typically Tropical The Trade winds are blowing strongly from the East and Cochise is bowling along under main and poled out genoa, presently heading directly towards St Lucia. At the moment we have a bright blue sky and glorious sunshine but around us throughout the day the clouds have been bubbling up and forming heavy black squally rainclouds. One of these hit us at 13.00 today, bringing a 30 deg veer in the wind which doubled in strength for 5 minutes with torrential rain. Simon and Joel were left on deck to fight it our whilst the rest of the crew disappeared below for a conveniently timed lunch, just to re-emerge as the sun reappeared. There seem to be fewer birds around at the moment, but the flying fish keep entertaining us, popping out of the sea like startled rabbits and. read more...

Mojomo - BxWx: Best EVER Weather Forecast!

BxWx sent us this.If only all weather forecasts were this fabulous... ============================= George Osbourne yesterday blessed the nation with his pre-budget report.Now, when electing him (if not by anything like a majority, the gulliblepopulation was were told that a short sharp moment of austerity wouldproduce the kind of GDP growth most non-political economists doubted waseven nearly credible. His forecast promising jam tomorrow (a bit like ARCforecasts of sustained trade winds) was a bit off the mark and thus hisdemeanor has now shifted to that of the grim reaper. So, the short sharpshock will now be more shocking a for a couple more years than he thought,with the poorest taking the larger share of the cuts and of course having towork for a few years longer too. So less jam. read more...

EH01 - LOG DAY 10 - Crew blog

Crew Blog. Day 10 on the Big Brother Boat and : Dave and Al are getting to know their new friends. Dave is in the zone on the helm for B Watch, and Al has just cooked a sensational omlette for each of us, ably assisted by his sous-chefs Jamie and Wayne. To the relief of all crew, the first mate has not been sent up the mast again. To celebrate, we are promised cashews with our apertifs. (Folllow Bertie on Twitter @whereisbert). Skip is being driven mad by panacotta: "Is is bread or cake ? I have to know!" Wayne's satellite phone has proved invaluable for keeping us up to date with X Factor evictions and football scores :-( We are running low on fresh food but Jamie and Dave still manage to produce great lunch wraps and sandwiches. On the dinner front the Wayfarer chicken tikka masala was. read more...

Mojomo - McSailing on St Andrew's Day.

19:37N 37:31Wabout 8knots cog 260T The ARC isn’t just about us lot out here on the sea in boats.Oh no.These days, it’s about world-wide experience-sharing via the website, which we take very seriously on Mojomo.The website info gets updated every four hours, it says, and we *think* that the update times are 12, 4 and 8 o’clock.  We haven’t done much about this so far, but today we decided to make a special effort and instead of pootling along at 7-8 knots with instantaneous surfs into the teens we caned an engine to 3000rpm to give us a sustained 10+ knots VMG, albeit for only a minute.I bet the web-crazed crowds around the worldwill be wetting themselves in excitement, and the numbers might show that we’ll hurtle into Rodders in record time.Maybe. read more...

Butterfly - Day 9

Mark; Past half way and nearly 2/3rds with only just over 1000 miles to go. All going well, managed to achieve over 175 miles yesterday. Last night was exciting with big squalls coming over with heavy rain, when I struggled out of my bunk to go on watch at 3.00am, Kenny and Lee were soaking but very excited , as Butterfly was flying along at 12knots! Those below decks find sleep quite difficult because of the noise and motion.Mike is making a lunch at the moment which will be the second to last salad as fresh supplies are running low, we then start to have fry ups!. Simon came below this morning with the wheel in his hands, saying it had fallen off and couldn’t get it back on,  had me going for a minute! Hope you all okay at home, thinking of you.   Mike: Lee caught. read more...

Engelen - Day 10 - Halfway and the two big ones that got away

HALFWAY!!!!!!!Last night we passed the halfway point of our trip.We are now aimed straight at St. Lucia and right in the middle of the trade winds.That means 15-20 knot winds right of the east pushing us straight on our course.The sailing is really a joy.The boat is just charging straight ahead at close to maximum hull speed - even going faster as she surfs down waves.Everyone has a smile on the face when they take over the helm for their shift.(Although, after four hours in the afternoon tropical sun, people are usually ready to hand over to someone else and settle in the shade in the cockpit or on the foredeck under the sail and snooze - as Roel is doing now - even though he's pretending he's reading instead of dozing.) To celebrate the halfway mark, we'll soon break out some of our. read more...

Sunrise - Log Day 11: Bergfest und ein Berg an Reparaturarbeiten

Mittwoch, 30. November 2011 - 11. Tag auf See Gestern war es so weit! Wir konnten mit einem kühlgestellten, herrlichen Champagner auf unser Bergfest anstossen! Die Hälfte der Strecke von Gran Canaria nach St. Lucia haben wir also erfolgreich hinter uns gebracht und nun gibt es definitiv nur noch einen Weg: mit Kurs 268 Grad direkt nach Rodney Bay zur Ziellinie! Und zu feiern hatten wir auch unsere Position im Ranking: am Morgen des 10. Tages auf See hatten wir tatsächlich unser Schwesterschiff die Skiathos um eine Seemeile hinter uns gelassen. Naja, dieser Vorsprung ist noch ausbaufähig und so geben wir alles beim Steuern des schwierigen Kurses vor dem Wind in Mitten der bis zu vier Meter hohen Wellen. Nachdem wir die. read more...

Ula - Log Day 10 Bread!

p { margin-bottom: 0.21cm; } Day 10 Bread! There are many ways to add value as a crew member on a long passage like this.Fishing skills, deck-swabbing skills, ability to tie a bowline and helm a straight course...they all come in handy.One of our number, a Herculean man-mountain, has proven uses as an experienced sailor and all-round good egg.But no-one knew that he was also an artisan baker. Following a breakfast of fresh banana (ripe at last!), lunch of fresh dorado (the one that didn't get away!), afternoon naps were forsaken in order to produce a fine country loaf of Herculean man-mountain proportions.To follow, and seeing as the oven was hot, a rum-infused chocolate brownie cake was also brought forth. Dinner, as you can imagine, was a delightful affair.Given the size of the loaf,. read more...

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