Saturday - 13 Dec.
Another beautiful day. I wonder, do the residents of Paradise (or California, southern Spain, and such sunny climes) ever get bored? We're coming up on three weeks at sea and will pass the ¾ way mark a little later today, gallantly struggling to make it to St. Lucia before the rest of the ARC fleet drinks the place dry. We know from radio communications with other boats that there was not been a lot of wind out here until the last couple days. But it has picked up, and the forecast tempts us with promises of more, if only we can get to where it is blowing. There will be many yachts arriving late in St. Lucia. We heard several talking the other day about missing an ARC dinner on the 18th. And these are boats a good deal larger than Rebel. One boat reported motoring for 24 straight hours, which mercifully we have not had to do.
We had good fun with our half-way celebration. We had a formal moving of the boat ARC number banner (fastened to the lifelines) from port to starboard, and added a glass of wine each to our meal by way of reward for our efforts. Then we moved on to popcorn for the 2/3 way celebration (thanks Bridget). We enjoyed the celebrations very much at the time, but each was immediately followed by a rainy, stormy night, so we're considering cancelling the 3/4 of the way bash and saving up for the
finish.
We've had three nights of rain, but last night just a brief shower or two. The squalls are pretty tame, but the rain can get quite heavy. The wind, even in the worst of the squalls, has only been mid-20s. We'd take that anytime so we could make up some ground, but it is tiring and messes up our sleep also the wind comes from all directions and we have to keep changing the sails. Today has been, beautiful and we're hoping we've run away from the squalls for the time being. Curiously, we've only hit squalls and rain at night. If there's to be another, we wouldn't mind trying it during the daylight.
The moon has become a special night companion. Last night it was full and was with us from sunset until just past sunrise. We're hoping for a clear night tonight so we can enjoy it again. The amount of light has to be seen to be believed. We can easily see to the horizon, and if not the small print in our books, at least we can read the covers without difficulty.
The food continues to be quite good, and we've managed to supplement our stores with fresh dorado. Indeed, having now eaten three of them in short order, we've retired the fishing gear for a bit. Add to that Iain's skills as a bread maker, and how can one go wrong?
We've got plenty of books, to say nothing of our sailing, cooking and cleaning duties, to keep us busy. Iain has had his penny whistle out several times, and at my suggestion the last time he tried a few Christmas carols. We've not got a tree onboard to decorate, so that will have to do for our holiday festivities.
On to St. Lucia.
Andy
One of the features of the trip is of course the fixing of bits that break, wear out, fall off etc. This passage is no exception I guess though we have been lucky. The yankee coming down and having to rig a pole out of the bits of the broken one was no doubt the biggest job. We also brought the genoa down and made sure we had seized the shackles holding that up as one embarrassment is enough for any trip - another sail falling down would had been one too far ! The poor old genoa is reaching the end of its days, and I had to get out the sail repair kit to stitch a small tear in the luff before it extended. Not a particularly neat job, but it does the trick.
Electrical wise we had an uneasy day when the watermaker refused to perform and reference to the manual provided the answer - located immediately over the engine compartment, it was overheating in the hot weather and a safety switch was tripping out. Running it with the cover open has solved the problem, albeit making for a rather noisy couple of hours when we charge the batteries.
Power management features high on our list of things to keep an eye on. We have solar panels and a tow generator as well as a beefed up battery management system on the main engine to maximise efficiency. Well with the light winds we have had, towing the tow gen has not been an option as it slows the boat by 0.5 knots in any but the briskest of breezes - 0.5 knots off boat speed extends the trip by around a day per week ! Judicious placement of the solar panels means that we are almost power neutral during the day. Night and periodic running of the SSB radio and satcomms see to us needing to run the engine for around 3 hours per day. Switching the nav computer off completely would cut that down significantly and is an option we keep when monitoring our diesel consumption and what we will need to arrive in St Lucia with some to spare.
The SSB radio seemed to be not up to scratch, given the care that had been put into installing it. A systematic check around it all revealed one loose power connection and the aerial cable cable coming adrift where it attaches to the back stay. Fixing that was a challenge as the connection is 10 feet from the deck.
The last and also we hope the least of the problems was the waterpump packing up yesterday. Partially emptying the cockpit locker and burying myself there to get access to it was apparently sufficient to get it to work again. Another slightly dodgy power cable connection I expect, but as long as it works we can fix that in St Lucia.
And finally - being an ageing Westerly, we have also been sticking up bits of lining that have been dangling in various corners of the cabin. That counts more as tidying than repairing I guess.
Losses overboard amount to one winch handle that must have slid through a small gap and off the deck during heavy rolling one night and a cereal bowl..
So we are kept busy between cooking, eating, sleeping and the occasional bit of washing!
Iain