Cleone - Fw: CLEONE Leg 17 Day 6 - Night Watch

 

It's ten to three in the morning, and Alex calls me awake; it's time for me to go on watch.  The wind is blowing at nearly thirty knots, with gusts up to thirty five.  There is a cup of tea waiting, and as I struggle into my life-jacket by the companionway, Alex grins down towards me, his face barely illumiated by the glow of the compass light.  "I'd get a waterproof" he says.   "Why, is it raining?".  "No, but it might be, and there is a lot of spray around".  So I stagger back aft, grab my Musto jacket, remove my life-jacket, get my Musto on, and disentangle the life-jacket - getting into it again is even worse.  I clip on, climb into the cockpit and wolf down the tea whilst Alex briefs me.  "There's been nothing to see, and the steering's fine except for when the waves catch her.  And the course is still 270 degrees."  Then he's down below to fill in the log and plot our position on the chart before levelling off peacefully on his bunk for 6 straight hours.

 

I am on my own now.  Cleone is well powered-up, even though there are two reefs in the Genoa, three in the Mainsail and another two in the Mizzen.  But despite the gusts, she answers the helm sweetly.  It's overcast, but above the clouds can be seen the faint glow of the moon.  The cockpit is dimly lit by the warm glow of the red instrument lights.  Dials flicker to show me wind-speed and direction, distance to go, boat speed, cross-track error and all sorts of other things.   I concentrate on the swinging compass plate (no needles these days) and the simple wind-arrow up high, illuminated by the mast-head tri-light.   The bright green particularly emphasises the phosphoresence sparkling in the wake on the starboard side, but even in the red of the port side it's impressive.  I look behind; more phosphoresence bubbles in the wake astern, and a huge wave with a breaking crest as it rushes towards us.  Cleone lifts her stern to it, the wave passes beneath us and thrusts us forward, a touch on the helm (more a powerful heave, actually - Ed) and we corkscrew over the top and rush down the front of it, the GPS briefly showing a speed of 13 knots.  I recover the course, and manage to hold it until the next wave catches us, this time throwing us sideways onto our beam ends.  The toe-rail submerges, and the cockpit is showered with spray.  Cleone recovers again, shrugs the water off her decks and sails serenely on.  It may be a dark,cloudy night, there may be rain showers about, there may be spray thrown at you every so often, and the wind may be moaning in the rigging (and it does).  But this is not the North Sea in an October gale or even a computer screen in an office in London - it's the warm Indian Ocean and we are heading for Mauritius at over 7 knots.  But Cleone's weight, and her long, heavy keel (a disatvantage when it comes to beating or running in a light breeze) give her an easy motion and good directional stability even in a sea as confused as these.  Believe me, gale or not, there are a lot worse places to be.

 

The rest of the fleet is making great progress too.  Many of them are reporting uncomfortably bumpy rides, and the light-weight Chantelle is streaming a warp to slow her down and to help prevent her broaching.  It's the sort of weather that tests boats and crews.  But crews are well acclimatised, and all are well and happy, and Cleone is still up with the pack, even if it's the tail-enders!

 

 

It's been more classic trade-wind sailing (again) and we are another 170 miles to the good.