Daily Logs

Flomaida II - 4 faule Tage und 4 erlebnisreiche Tage im Komodo Nationalpark vom 25.08.- 01.09.2015

4 Tage verbringen wir am Anker in der Bucht von Waicicu bei Labuan Bajo auf Flores.Wir genießen jeden Abend das preiswerte Essen in den verschiedenen Restaurants der Resorts am Strand und auch die herrlichen Korallen unter Wasser.Und totaler Luxus! Dank unserer Verstärkerantenne bekommen wir gutes Internet an Bord und somit die Möglichkeit, viel zu erledigen inklusive meines aktualisierten Logbuches, nun auch zu lesen über- www.flomaida.blogspot.com - ,was sicher für Viele einfacher ist.Auch müssen wir mal wieder einkaufen und fahren dazu in die Stadt, die neben Bali als Touristenmetropole aufgebaut werden soll. Fast erschlagen hat uns mal wieder der extreme Krach und auch der Müll direkt neben dem offenen Markt! Auf dem Weg zu derRanger Station auf Loh Buaya legen wir noch eine. read more...

Trick - Trick arrives in Las Palmas

Preparing and waiting for the adventure.. read more...

Shiva - Log day -90: Shiva & crew are getting prepared

August 7, 2015 – On a sunny Friday afternoon the Shiva crew, fully complete, got together in Hoog Soeren, the Netherlands. Under the fine hospitality of Herman & Inge the crew members started sharing their expectations, plans and dreams about the Atlantic Crossing. After months of preparation by Herman & Inge and weeks of excitement of the 4 additional crew members it was a great pleasure to be gathered together with the final group of 6 that will experience the ARC 2015 with Sailing Yacht Shiva. From discussions about the number of eggs to bring on board, to clothing and medical aid kits, to wonders about the wave heights and dreams of dolphins and flying fish and blue panoramas... It was a great first get-together and now the countdown has officially started for us! About Shiva. read more...

Starblazer - 24/08/2015 - Darwin

The past couple of days have been filled with highs and one negative.The negative is the wind, barely there and very changeable!We have motored almost non-stop since Saturday morning, only turning it off for the radio net at 0900 and 1800.At times we could have sailed slowly but we wanted to catch the tide down the Dundas Straight at about 1900 on Sunday so we motored.Now for the positives.The seas have become smooth with only a slight swell allowing us to take showers comfortably.The watermaker is now working well, we have filled the tanks to the top twice since leaving Cairns.John has finally landed a fish; since leaving Mackay almost three weeks ago he has lost at least three fish.One broke the line taking the lure and weight with it, a second one mangled the lure and straightened out. read more...

Exody - Days 221-225: Over the Top

.......of Australia that is, having now passed the northern Queensland tip of Cape York with a fair tide and a fair wind lunchtime Wednesday 19th - great scenery through the Albany channel - golden beaches, wooded islands and hills - a 4WD wild camper's dream!We rode the tide for hours reaching over nine knots through the Endeavour Strait, past Prince of Wales Island, clearing Peebles shoals and Rothesay Banks en route for the Gulf of Carpentaria.The familiar Scottish names a powerful reminder both of home and the history of this country. Exody, Firefly, Starblazer and Garlix had left the calm brown waters of 'pearl farm' estuary Escape River first thing that morning, Exody leading the small World ARC convoy, by dint of an earlier start - fully allowable during 'free cruising'!Only Luna. read more...

Y2K - Y2K - PRE-ARC Day 2 - Heading to Gibraltar- Trapani (Sicily) to Villasimius (Sardinia)

The african high pressure on the Mediterranean Sea starts weakening mid August, exactly when we decide to leave Trapani. Cold fronts from the Atlantic start getting their influence on Italian seas bringing strong winds, gale force, rough sea and pouring rain.The first time we try to cast off is August 15th but as soon as we approach the island of Levanzo we fight against a terrible sea from West – waves more than 2 meters high – and against strong winds. We have to sail about 150 nautical miles with these weather conditions and honestly it is not appealing at all. We are not in any rush after all. We decide to go back to Levanzo where we pick up a mooring ball, enjoy the rest of the day and the gorgeous view, well protected in the bay of Cala Fredda.The next morning the weather changes. read more...

Allegro - 4A FEIRA 22 DE JULHO DE 2015 A DOMINGO 23 DE AGOSTO DE 2015

Há 2 ou 3 dias atrás constatámos que as últimas linhas enviadas para o blog/log tinham sido enviadas há já 1 mês…Como o tempo passa. Sobretudo quando há coisas importantes.E foi o que aconteceu. Neste mês houve algumas coisas a exigir mais do nosso tempo:1 - A travessia de Port Vila para Mackay;2 - Termos chegado à Austrália;3 - WARC até ao fim ou não?4 - O gerador (maldito);5 - Sydney;6 - A tripulação doente;7 - A avaria de última hora.É destas questões que vamos agora falar.1 - A travessia de Port Vila para MackayDecorreu bem de início, com condições realmente favoráveis.Mas depois, no terceiro dia, a meteorologia deixou de nos ajudar e a seguir zangou-se connosco. Não nos devemos zangar com ela porque tem argumentos violentos que às vezes utiliza de forma inesperada - muito vento,. read more...

Widago - English Channel @ Night

With the ARC Baltic Rally literally in our wake, WIDAGO now makes haste towards the UK. And just time - I was in a near panic earlier today at teatime only to find we were in fact out of English Tea. Luckily we are scheduled to arrive in Brighton prior to our next afternoon delight - hopefully we will be treated to a proper English teatime...crumpets, scones, clotted cream (hmmmm), and obviously a larger pair of stretch pants for yours truly. Before I get into any more details of this particular journey, I wanted to give a huge thank you to Joel & Cecelia with World Cruising Club for leading our family through a fantastic adventure in the Baltic Sea. Always smiling, constantly corralling, these folks wrangled 19 vessels and their crews with grace, style, and patience. We miss our. read more...

Luna Quest - Saturday, 22nd August, 2015

Noon Position: 12.26S 130.49EDaily logged run: 125 miles to arrival time at 6.45amSince noon yesterday we have been on the engine to get to Darwin as the wind had failed completely. Tidal streams were very random, both in direction and strength. Julia took the watch in the evening, marking our progress on the Admiralty paper charts. At midnight the tidal streams had halved our progress from that earlier in the evening when we were making over 7 knots. We increased the revolutions of the engine to give us 5 knots. It was now my turn to take watch and mark our progress on the chart. Soon we were faced to negotiate a narrow channel between two reef islands, when to my consternation a ship was entering the same channel from the opposite direction at 6 knots. First, I saw its steaming lights,. read more...

Y2K - PRE-ARC Day 1 - New Horizons

April, May, June and July, it looks like they never end. They are hectics, there are tensions all over. We are still very much into our “old” working lives.Alex has to complete her  termination notice – tree long months April to June – while Max is dealing with a new big project kicked-off in early April and now at its peak.We spend our limited free time, mostly at night, unmarking, checking and re-checking an endless list of items to buy, review, complete, ship to Trapani. And the more we unmark, the more items get added to that endless list.June comes to an end, Alex says goodbay to her 25 years long job while Max is having hard time managing that project for the entire month of July. We travel to Trapani and stay there one week. We start working on board setting up new equipments,. read more...

Firefly - Rough passage across the Gulf of Carpentaria

Its Saturday 22nd August and Firefly is sailing across the Arufura sea bound for Darwin. We passed north of Cape Wessel yesterday at midday. In company with Exody, Garlix and Starblazer we left Escape River on Wednesday morning at 0900. This was conveniently timed so that went through the Albany Passage with a north flowing current and rounded Cape York at 1230 at the start of the west flowing current. From there we turned west and had a great sail passed the various islands through the Endeavour Strait. The maximum current flow was about 3 to 4 knots as we sailed passed Possession Island.Its relatively shallow water in the Strait and towards the end, some 30 miles from Cape York, the water gets gradually shallower to the point were we had about 5 meters under Firefly. It was blowing. read more...

Starblazer - 22/08/2015 – Random Musings

Sailors are rarely satisfied.A couple of days ago we had too much wind, now there is not enough.The direction is wrong, or rather we could sail faster in the weak breeze if it would just wander around 30-40 degrees in either direction.One positive is that the seas are a lot calmer so living on board is easier.My next thought concerns making life easier for the galley slave who often does the provisioning as well.As we sail double handed I know how much rice we like so, to save the trouble of measuring it or weighing it in a rolly boat on an ocean passage, I weigh up meal size amounts and put them in small zip lock bags in my rice canister.I do the same with instant mashed potato flakes, a useful standby, but the packets are always far too big for two people.In the canister with the bags. read more...

Seraphina of Chichester - Seraphina arrives to Las Palmas

We had a great run down from Gibraltar to Las Palmas. Having left on Monday 10th August we tracked across towards the NW corner of Morocco and set a SW course to a point around 100 miles of the coast at El Jadida. In doing so wefound we picked up the smoother Atlantic swell than the chop that is found in the shallower waters closer to the African coast. From there on it was a clear downwind run all the way to the port of Arreceif on Lanzarote. On the way we encountered very strong winds with gusts well into the 40 knots. Seraphina handled it all beautifully and took it all in her stride. We had ample opportunity to try out various downwind sail combinations and found a poled out genoa and main on a preventer to be ideal in the blustery conditions with steep following seas. We spent a. read more...

Luna Quest - Friday, 21st August, 2015

Noon Position: 11.15S 131.42EDaily logged run: 137 milesAt 4am this morning we changed our westerly course for Darwin. Soon we found ourselves amongst the islands, whose passages we have to navigate to get ourselves into the approaches to the Port of Darwin. The islands form narrow channels with reefs dotted around. One should not stray off too far from the recommended route in case of part or engine failure. Among the islands there are fierce tidal streams and when the wind failed at midday today, we found that even the engine had difficulty giving us a steady heading despite its 2000 revs. There are many overfalls and vortexes and at one point we thought Luna Quest had picked something up round the propellor as she was only achieving a speed of just under 1 knot. At the same time the. read more...

Starblazer - 21/08/2015 = Halfway to Darwin

When we left Cairns on Sunday morning our planned trip was a non-stop,rather zig-zag distance of 1022 nM.  The predominant winds should beestablished SE trades in the 15-25  knot range allowing for a fast sail andthere are two tidal gates to get right.  At midnight Thursday we had sailed622 miles but we are actually more than halfway there because we have had a lotof help from the tide. We had celebratory steak and chips for a slightly earlyhalfway celebration on Wednesday evening because it felt like halfway havingrounded Cape York and navigated through the Endeavour Straight.   That was the plan, now for some detail.  The first few days of thetrip, from Cairns to Cape York, were in the protected waters within the GreatBarrier Reef however there isn’t just one. read more...

Flomaida II - Inselopping von Alor bis Flores

Das Inselhopping von Ost nach West entlang der vielen dünnbesiedelten und touristisch total vernachlässigtenInseln (für die Menschen und für uns zum Glück!) hat uns versöhnt, nachdem wir in Kupang doch im Zweifel waren, ob diese Wahl der Route die richtige war.Mittlerweile sind wir davon überzeugt, denn landschaftlich sind die Inselketten voller Gebirge, aktiver Vulkane und Riffe in Farben und Struktur eine völlig neue Bereicherung. Und auch seglerisch ist es eine besondere Herausforderung, denn unser Kartenmaterial ist ungenau oder einfach falsch! Da die Inseln oft von Riffen geschützt sind, machen wir strikt nur Tages Törns und verlassen uns bisher erfolgreich auf unsere Augen. "Eyeball Navigation" ist der seglerische Ausdruck dafür. Und wer hilft uns noch?? Ein spezielles Programm von. read more...

Luna Quest - Thursday, 20th August, 2015

Noon Position: 10.50S 133.47EDaily logged run: 157 milesEvery morning we find several flying fish expired on deck together with some other variety of small fry. Unfortunately, they are all too small and bony to complement a meal. We have attempted fishing, but without much success. The weather continues fine and we are making good progress. We now think that we might arrive on Saturday, but because we have to go through an aquatic bio security inspection, which cannot take place until Monday morning followed by a 10-hour quarantine period, we shall not be in Tipperary Marina until Tuesday, if all goes well. We have engaged a rigger to effect repairs to the forestay and have emailed an electronics man to test our mast-headed VHF aerial, but we are determined not to hang around too much. read more...

Luna Quest - Wednesday, 19 August, 2015

Noon Position: 10.46S 136.06EDaily logged run: 150 milesThe weather continues fine, blue skies, good sailing breezes from the East/South East and full sunshine. A school of dolphins kept us company for quite some time yesterday afternoon, ducking and diving at the bow. Luna Quest was making around 6.5knots, while the dolphins were able to accelerate and swim much faster. This morning we found a tired bird perched on the lifelines. We have had him before sitting on deck, but this time he was perched huddled up as though the plastic-wrapped life lines were a thin branch of a tree. He did not seem to mind being rolled about. When the sun had gathered a little strength, he preened himself before flying off for breakfast.Eric. read more...

Amaltea - Amaltea' trip

We are leaved from aguadulce, spain,visit Malaga ,la Calleta and arrived in gibraltar in queen's quay marina.25/05 we leave for Canarias islands where arrive 30/ 5 in Graciosa, very nice place.6/07 Arecife in lanzarote then puerto calerò,puerto del Rosario Fuerteventura, marina rubicon and Morro jable.5/07 las palmas in gran canaria marina de la luz where in november we leave whit arc+2015 , we meet a lot of small /medium sailboat ready for Atlantic crossing.2/08 st cruz de Tenerife, 17/07 la Palma island where now we are.Ho Carlo/Lory. read more...

Shenanigan - ARC Baltic draws to a close

After a night on the island of Oland, we had a perfect sail for the last 15 miles to our final ARC Baltic destination of Kalmar, arriving earlier than the rest of the fleet in time for Mack and Col’s arrival.  As we entered Kalmar marina we heard Mack and Col calling from the dock; they too at their destination (with panniers full of bubbly for a certain person’s birthday) having motor-biked over 1,100 miles to meet us.  Tales of both journeys shared over drinks and barbeque that evening.Alexandra and Amelia flew in on Friday making us eight on the boat.  We spent Saturday watching the Ironman competition taking part in Kalmar.  These guys really have to be admired.  Over 2,000 competitors, both pro and amateur, starting their day at 6.55am with a 3.8km swim off. read more...

Exody - Days 199-220 : Shore leave and Barrier Reef cruise

The evening air chilled as we disembarked from Jetstar at Gold Coast Airport on Tuesday evening 28th July, met by Marian's old friend Ian, 25 years resident in Australia, now at Nobby's Creek near Murwillumbah.We stayed the rest of the week on his 87 acre rainforested estate set in mountainous surroundings near Mount Warning. In his 'retirement' he has a ten year project painstakingly recovering and replanting the rainforest trees and shrubs, mostly singlehandedly.We awoke every morning in his cool 'summer' bedroom overlooking a subtropical gardenscape , birdsong the only sound and a watching dark brown swamp wallaby. We walked the contours to all boundaries, heard, but not learned, the latin names of everything - the one that stuck was enemy number one - the Lantana weed.We drove. read more...

Firefly - Green Turtles but no Crocs at Margaret Bay

Today is Tuesday 18th August, Firefly was underway at 0600 bound for the Escape River, within 25 miles of Cape York. We have about 15 knots of wind and are running with the sails goose winged at about 7 knots. The sun is on its way up in the sky and Firefly is just rolling a little in the small wavelets as we are still well protected from any ocean swells by the Great Barrier Reef - sailing here is superb!We are in company with Garlix and Exody and having gone differing routes for a few days we met up again in Margaret's Bay on the north side of Cape Melville. We were last with Garlix at Low Islets and Exody in Cooktown. Most of the World ARC fleet, of which there are only about 10 boats currently, are in touch on a daily basis via informal sessions on the SSB at 0900 and 1800. This is. read more...

Luna Quest - Tuesday, 18th August, 2015

Noon Position: 10.44S 138.24EDaily logged run: 138 milesLast night the wind failed to fill the sails and we had to rely on our engine to help propel us across the Gulf of Carpentaria, but today the wind has picked up from the South giving us a beam reach at 6.5knots. The sun is out in full strength and whereas in Mackay it had felt definitely chilly, here, some 700 miles further north, the temperature is a pleasant 28C. Julia has applied new whippings to the pole lines and has also mended the fraying line of the water-towed generator. We have towed the generator for thousands of miles, never realising it did not produce any electricity, but now that it does, it is beginning to fray round the edges! It is such a powerful source of electricity, that we have emailed a rigger in Darwin to. read more...

Lucky Star - test

Hey. read more...

Luna Quest - Monday, 17th August, 2015

Noon Position: 10.46S 140.35EDaily logged run: 127 milesThe weather continues fine with full sun shine and good saiiing breezes from the Southeast. We are on schedule to make Darwin by Monday the 24th to undergo a bio inspection of the hull. There were several ships last night on the same or opposite course to ours, so that we were kept on our guard. The one marked difference between the Pacific and the Arafura Sea is the absence of swell. The Pacific is a deep ocean of several thousand metres, whereas the Arafura Sea is only 50 metres deep. Eric. read more...

Lanchen - On the way to Las Palmas

(test blog)We are sailing from Germany to Las Palmas slowly.With each step further towards the South on the Atlantic coast, the weather seems getting a bit worse.Just wish to see a bit of sunshine soon.IMG_20150815_172748. read more...

Luna Quest - Sunday, 16th August, 2015

Noon Position: 10.46S 142.40EDaily logged run: 144 milesThe turquoise blue waters of the Coral Sea are now behind us. At 1pm today we rounded the top of Queensland to enter the pale green waters of the Arafura Sea. Whereas we had planned to enter the Torres Strait further north, we were lucky enough to have a good fresh breeze, a cooperating tidal stream and day light not to worry about random islets strewn about in these treacherous waters. We cut the corner and by taking the Endeavour Strait into the Arafura Sea, we avoided the busy shipping channels and benefited from a shorter distance to our destination of Darwin, some 725 miles to our west. One of the many islands ahead of us was enveloped in smoke and later appeared entirely ablaze. Since Cairns we have had glorious sailing. read more...

Firefly - North to Cape York

The 'Champagne Sailing' got a bit 'bubbly' over the last 2 days with the trade winds reaching 35 knots. Both going into Cooktown, and on from there to Lizard Island Firefly was absolutely flying, just about keeping her grip in a short choppy sea. Arriving in Cooktown we made the decision to keep sail up until we entered the small harbour and got shelter from the wind. The plan worked fine but we did wonder as we raced down the dredged channel to where we could see a calm area behind 'Cook's' hill, just before we reached the calm patch there was an enormous gust just to make things even tighter. Sails down and under control we motored a short distance to Thomas's quay and tied up alongside his new pontoon, avoiding anchoring in the tricky, shallow Endeavour River. Thomas was a real Aussie. read more...

Starblazer - 16/08/2015 - To Cairns

A brief overview of the trip: we motored the whole way, though got a bit of help from the genoa for the last hour before turning into the dredged entry channel to Cairns.However, it was not a boring trip.We had barely set off when a whale made its presence known off to starboard,first of all with a tail slap then various waves of a fin together with quite obvious blows as it moved further away.That is the first whale I have seen on this trip.Early Thursday morning I heard a noise a bit like an underwater explosion from behind us.I looked back in time to see a mass of boiling water quickly followed by a whale blowing and thrashing a fin in the water.Again it was not interested in us and moved further away.The other major experience of the trip was avoiding the shipping.John had the worst. read more...

Why Not - Hotting up.

Hello to all other ARC Entrees, I am sure like all of you we are up to our neck in trying to make sure all the i's are dotted and t's are crossed ready in time for Rally in November.  We have 4 weeks left back before we head back to Valencia to board "Why Not" and get her down to Gibraltar and then down to Gran Canaria.Before we head back, though we have 2 weeks Salmon fishing in Scotland.  When we head back to Valencia we will be joined by a couple of friends who fancy a few days at sea!  Hopefully it will be downwind sailing as they have never sailed in any extremes or for any distance, just a bit of bay hoping so they maybe in for a bit of a shock. Looking forward to restocking the galley in Gibraltar, where we will say goodbye to our friends and welcome a new crew. read more...

Lyonesse - Helsinki - Mariehamn - Stockholm

Samstag, 15. August 2015Viel Abwechslung in der letzten Woche – daher mal wieder nur Stichpunkte:Bisher entspannteste Woche der ARC Baltic dank kürzerer Tagesetappen - viel Spaß an Bord mit den neuen Crewmitgliedern Kerstin, Lutz, Kendall und Felix – malerische Ankerbuchten – romantische Sonnenuntergänge – schnelles Segeln – Dockparties (Highlight: jedes Boot sollte einen Cocktail erfinden, der die Erfahrungen der ARC Baltic reflektiert ...) – Drinks / Essen mit den Crews von Oojah, Northern Light, Widago, Persuasion etc. – Nebel (grrrr, nicht so schön) – quirliges Saltsjöbaden (schon wieder ne Hochzeit) – Altstadtbummel und leckere Sushi in Stockholm – Kerstin und Lutz müssen leider schon wieder nach Hause – beeindruckendes Wasa-Museum - Abschiedsessen mit Axel von der Moboe – letzte. read more...

Eau Too - blog

Boat is being prepared in Turkey for circumnavigation. read more...

Luna Quest - Saturday, 15th August, 2015

Noon Position: 12.48S 143.36EDaily logged miles: 158Near gale force winds and a reefed poled-out genoa to port as her only means of propulsion, Luna Quest powered her way through the Great Barrier Reef at speeds of around 7.5 knots. The autopilot is doing all the steering and despite its hungry power consumption, the new wind generator and the now properly connected water-towed generator, have kept the power level in the batteries at 100% throughout the night. The Hydrovane has been made temporarily redundant with the vane stored down below. It will be used again for crossing oceans when cloud cover inhibits the solar panels from working efficiently and a lack of wind constrains the output from the water-towed and wind generators. The seas of the Coral Sea have been quite rough despite. read more...

Four Seasons - First entry !

So, we have 7 days before our departure from the U.K. Loads of things still left to do, some will have to wait until we get further south. Most major jobs complete and the watermaker is fitted. Trisail track still needs about 40 holes drilled and tapped in the mast ! and we have an annoying leak somewhere in the fresh water system which we can't find. we have to turn the pressurised pump off when not being used. Still deciding whether to take the spare furling genoa. Decisions, decisions. More next time.Chris and Caroline. read more...