Daily Logs

Falcon Spirit - Falcon Spirit days 1-6 updates

We had an eventful start. at the recommendation of a rigger, we added a soft shackle to the bottom of our gennaker to save metal on metal wear on falcon spirits bow sprit. 1 hour prior to the start, our water stopped working completely. as the crew circled inside of the breakwater, i checked for clogs, checked the motor and discovered that our water filter housing had cracked somehow after closing off our bow tanks to isolate 2 of our four tanks to protect from contamination.working theory is some kind of vacuum or over pressure. New filter on and tanks opened, everything started working again 20 minutes prior to the start. Main up, gennaker up and ready to deploy, as we did, the soft shackle spun until breaking sending the sail 75 feet in the air. The crew jumped into gear and got the. read more...

Cohiba - Day 6 - Time flies when you are having fun

Amusement on board.  1 Photographing people sleeping.(corpsed) 2 some sort of phone game including numbers. 3 Reading 4 Eating Last night 0100 - 0600 shift was eventful, “looks like rain” says John, “think I will get my top”, “OK” says Chris at the helm.  Needless to say it was only when I (John) saw Chris’ wet clothes in the head I realized he didn’t have his top on for the squalls, my excuse, it was dark and he didn’t complain...... Hey ho thats life at sea, at least I was dry to finish the shift. Curry for supper, thanks Mark, Cecilie has baked bread. Sanders sweetie store keeps us all high on sugar. All well on the good ship Cohiba. Written by John (the slightly older, slimmer and better looking brother, but’s that’s a tale for another day). read more...

Rhapsody - Rhapsody - Day Four: Alarming amounts of pasty flesh

Life onboard has settled into a smooth routine onboard Rhapsody. The green monster has gone, leaving all crew happy, hungry and eager to get involved. But it hasn’t all been plain sailing. Our initial excitement at seeing our poled-out headsail turned to consternation a few hours later when a loud creaking sound indicated the pole track was being slowly wrenched off the mast. Riveting it back in place turned out not to be an option as the rivet gun is too big to fit into the track, so we resorted to the tried-and-trusted method of lashing it up with a bit of string. It’s worked so far. Only another 2,000 or so miles to go…Fishing has proved similarly frustrating. We’ve been working our way through the various lures onboard, naming them as we go. Fred, Ollie and Stan have been. read more...

Mistral of Portsmouth - Santa Marta

Well - what a place! Big buzz, cool vibe, super hot temperatures! We loved it. Lots of breeze in the marina which was modern, clean and friendly. The marina sits at the edge of the old town which has a permanent carnival atmosphere - loud, colourful and relaxed. The streets are narrow, incredibly badly kept (pot holes, broken pavements) and carry hundreds of mad motor bikes and many small, old and battered cars. Electric cables form a birds nest at every corner. Restaurants carry signs confirming no guns inside (thank goodness for that!). Music comes at you from every direction - occasionally, total sensory overload!Chris and I did a half day city tour with other sailing crew … out of the city to see a national park with the Sierra Nevada mountains in the distance. The park was a. read more...

Ca Canny - Day 5- A Relaxed Day

position: 20:42'26"N 23:2'54"W Today we woke up with a clear plan, knowing that we're going to stop at Cape Verde. We are all fairly content that this is the best idea, and that it should not add too much time onto our journey, so it seems that all of us are feeling much more relaxed now. It has been a lovely sunny day, and for those of us that are capable of tanning (Charlie and Smithie, definitely not Alan Izzy or David) it was a good opportunity for them to sun themselves on the deck. Charlie here..I spy with my little eye something beginning with S.......SeaI spy with my little eye something beginning with S.......SkyI spy with my little eye something beginning with S.......SailsI spy with my little eye something beginning with S.......Sweet and Sour for Tea You get the idea, we are. read more...

Maroro - Leg 2, Day 2 Morning

Big wind and big seas welcomed us yesterday as the fleet left Santa Marta. Such a pretty day to sail! We had an uneventful, quiet afternoon, settling into the rhythm of cruising mode. We are purposefully sailing conservatively and relatively slowly…aiming to make it to our destination in daylight the morning of Day 3. We were treated to a spectacular sunset, the fiery ball of a Sun plopped ever so quietly over the horizon, leaving a pink stained sky behind it. The moon soon followed the path forged by the sun, this time just a sliver of light. Imanol was treated to a shooting star in the middle of the night. At 4 am (just when Annie arrived for her night shift) the autopilot decided not to work… it wasn’t until Simon came back to the wheel at 7am that it decided to fire back up. Ander,. read more...

Cohiba - Day 5 - Captains Blog Star Date 19012023

Days seem to drift by as if by magic. The sun rises every morning at a slightly different time and sets again in the evening slightly later than the day before.  Night time is a spectacular sight of who knows how many millions of stars, bioluminescence, and a strange beak nosed creature that swims with us for hours creating an awesome display of high speed turns and sometimes even a jump and a splash. Life onboard is steady we have now all had showers and are relaxing into the reading stage of the voyage even the youngest crew member has read a few pages.  This morning sunrise was a special moment as I watched Pauline waving gently back and forth in the morning breeze. An interesting crew member who once you get to know and trust will guide us perfectly to all our destinations. read more...

Ca Canny - Day 4- Finding a Solution

We woke up today disappointed that our problem did not miraculously fix itself. From the limited research we have been able to do and our own brainstorming, we had been left with only one solution: that someone would need to go up the mast. This can be daunting even in the still of a marina, never mind out in the Atlantic. Alan (skipper) insisted that he be the one to go up, even though he is 74 years old, a decision that didn't go down very well with his daughter (me). But up the mast he went, as we watched nervously and tried to shout to him, telling him where he could place his feet or hands for more stability. The further up he got the more he started to swing side to side, the motion becoming more powerful as he went, and with less things he could grab onto to keep still. Once he. read more...

Ca Canny - Day 3- Smooth Sailing (until it wasn't)

position: N/A I am writing this on day four since day three took a bit of a turn. It started out great, much smoother seas and making pretty good speed. We even had two proper meals for lunch and dinner, it was turning out to be exactly what we wanted.. right up until the evening. A lovely dinner was in the oven, the spinnaker was out and flying beautifully, until the wind stopped, or changed, and we went out to the deck to find the spinnaker wrapped around the forestay. Dad said he had heard of this issue before but never actually encountered it, we looked up and thought up solutions: back winding it, gibing the mainsail, but it was one step forward and two steps back, it would unwrap once, then wrap around again. Once it got dark we had to make the decision to leave it until morning,. read more...

Cohiba - Dag 4

I natt så vi masse stjerner på himmelen. Det er fint vær og varmt. Vi sitter i shorts og t-shorte. Onkel Mark lagde middag Igår. Det smakte akkurat som gulasj. Veldig godt. Vi har dusjet idag. Det var litt regn før idag, men det gikk bort heldigvis. Tante Cecilie har laget yoghurt igår. Vi fikk en Blue finn Tuna igår, men vi måtte kaste den. -Sander. read more...

Rhapsody - Rhapsody - Day Two: One pole, no fish

The winds have eased to a consistent 17 knots and with it the sea state has settled, making life on board Rhapsody much more comfortable.Mid-morning we raised the mainsail to Reef 1 and we poled out the genoa.We practised poling out the genoa before we left but, as with all things at sea, it was not quite as straightforward doing it for real. The track that the pole comes down the mast on didn’t run smoothly and clearly there is a knack to that particular manoeuvre that we were missing. Terry and Jac battled away valiantly on the foredeck and eventually we managed to get it down.With the pole in position, our next challenge was to unfurl the genoa and grind it in. Another task that proved to be a little tricky due to the angle of the sheet from the pole to the deck. Lines re-run and a. read more...

Cohiba - Dag 3

Idag har John bursdag. Vi feiret med egg og bacon og kake. Tante Cecilie skjærte opp mango og vi spiste nesten opp alt. Det er veldig fint vær med blå himmel og sol. I går laget Chris middag, noe som var veldig godt. Jeg har vært sjøsyk de siste dagene, men det begynner og komme seg, pga sjøsyk tabletter. Vi har seilt mellom 7 - 9 knop. Jeg fikk se en film som jeg hadde lastet ned fra Netflix. Og vurderer og begynne på en bok. Chris og John leser mye. Tante Cecilie hører på lydbok og onkel Mark har gjort mye forskjellig.-Sander. read more...

Ca Canny - Day 2- Still tumbling!

Position: 25:23'58"N 17:51'54"W   Second day at sea and it's a little rockier thanexpected honestly. Last night after I wrote that last post we had to reduce thesails, taking down the foresail entirely and heavily reducing the mainsail, asthe wind was getting a bit too high and we were going a little too fast. Todaythe wind is down a bit but still a decent swell which is making cooking prettyimpossible, it's just been sandwiches until this evening when Charlie managed toget some frozen pizzas in the oven. Smithy has been rather seasick too, which Iforgot to mention yesterday, but this evening he arose for a little while andmanaged some pizza.  Another positive- we saw dolphins! It was very rough atthe time so no pictures sadly (even though I haven't been able to get pictureson. read more...

Rhapsody - Rhapsody Departure Day: Fruity conditions at race start…

Ahoy from the sunny Atlantic where the crew of Rhapsody are slowly remembering what life at sea is like.A mere 24 hours ago we were motoring out of Las Palmas harbour, on our way to race start, and excitedly going through our very serious pre-race routine (discussing how many items of fruit we have budgeted for each day) when all of a sudden disaster struck. Kitty spotted it first and the horrified look on her face alerted the rest of us to a problem. Following her gaze, we saw it. One of our fruit nets had broken and unceremoniously dumped its precious cargo of oranges and apples into the water. With race start looming we jumped into action, grabbing buckets and nets and deftly adapting our Man Overboard manoeuvres to reclaim as much of our fruit as we could before belatedly heading to. read more...

Falcon Spirit - daily update

2-3 meter seas on our starboard quarter. gusts to 38. steady 26-30. surfing down waves  11-12.5 knots with our best 13.7 Currently we have a double reefed main and double reefed jib.  Spirited conditions to say the least for our first night as predicted.  Crew is happy and getting into the groove.  . read more...

Ca Canny - Day 1- We're off!

Position: 27:14'38"N 15:21'44 W An exciting start to the ARC January 2023! We set off at 12:45pm and had a little trouble gettingthe main sail up but once we had the sails up we were sorted. Now we are makinggood progress south before we turn further west (probably tomorrow). As this is the first blog post it might be a goodtime to introduce the crew: Alan Spence- Skipper, ex-fisherman and general nauticalenthusiast. Charlie Fleming- Oil field sub-sea consultant and verykeen on cars, an interest he shares with Smithy.  David Thompson- Lobster fisherman from the Highlands. Ian Smith (Smithy) - Builder and construction companyowner.  Izzy Spence - Daughter of Alan, not as practical as theother crew members but I'll keep them in line! That's. read more...

Mistral of Portsmouth - Day 6 - Crossing the finishing line

After our fish catching excitement, we began to get ourselves ready for the finishing line … what excitement after 6 days at sea! Decks cleared, shoes and gloves on, briefing from the Captain on the sail plan for the last 5 miles.I should mention that at the beginning of the passage, we were asked to estimate our arrival time. Chris had guessed at 5pm local time on Thursday … unbelievably, it looked as though we would be close to this. Of course, as this realisation dawned, so did the ambition to make the time across the line as close to 5pm as possible! We turned our last corner around the coast 5 miles away from Santa Marta - all sails out with a small reef taken on the Genoa (power sail that drives the boat). And wow … the wind accelerated from 12 knots to 28 knots … we acted fast to. read more...

Pantiki - PANTIKI photos

PANTIKI testing storm jib 2 Dec 22PANTIKI on stone LP Jan 14 23dolphins on way to Las Palmas Dec 30 22 last item mounting the lightning rod Jan 14 23. read more...

Pantiki - PANTIKI ready for start

It was very hard two years to a) get PANTIKI ready for offshore sailing, b) get PANTIKI to Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, app 1500 sm from Volos, Greece, via Kalamata, Patras, Aegio, Ithaka, Crotone (Italy), San Vito (Sicilia), Mallorca, Ibiza, Almerimar, La Linea (Gibraltar), finally Las Palmas on Jan. 1st.The two weeks in Las Palmas were very busy with issues of the generator (PAGURO), chargers (we changed to Victron) and all the details that are mandatory for the ARC. It was sweetened by the welcome-committee of our sons, her spouses and three grandchildren- so emotional after the longest time offshore so far. Now- on the evening before the start - checking last emails, company issues, paperwork for dog and immigration to Saint Lucia. Looking forward to good times.. read more...

Mistral of Portsmouth - Day 5 - Santa Marta is within reach!

Another uneventful night - good, as we are all starting to feel tired by the end of our watches. The wind was a consistent force 4 to 5 (between 12 and 20 knots) and we are back close to the rhumb line. The day promises to be another beautiful one and it started with big excitement at 8.30 in the morning - I saw whales! First sight was lots of activity in the water off the starboard bow and then spumes of water with 2 sightings of bodies emerging … the activity moved down the side of the boat and to our stern … sadly, no pictures as it all happened so fast. Still - we know they were there!The routine of the passage is well set by now. Daily deck checks have revealed some issues that will need attention when we reach land … a bent stanchion, the vang not holding pressure (we think an. read more...

Mistral of Portsmouth - Day 4 - 340 nm to go!

After a delicious paella, we are into our night watch routine. The wind is being kind to us - another quiet night without incident although there is quite a bit of rock and roll going on. At about 1am, we changed sail plan and changed course. We had been slowly working our way west toward the Venezuela coastline - not a safe place to be with a reputation for pirates. So we pulled in the mainsail and headed north west on a reach with the Genoa and Staysail. With only the fore sails out, the boat is not so well balanced - lots of rocking means lots of rolling across the beds and not much sleep! However, my watch from 4am to 7am was beautiful - it was as though someone switched the light on as the moon rose into the starry sky. The fishing line has gone out early today - we’re hoping that. read more...

Maroro - Day 5, Finally Grooving

So far, we’ve had both a lovely crossing as well as one full of small frustrations that have kept us on our toes. In between little shots of anxiety/adrenaline we’ve also enjoyed our family time together: cooking, eating, school work, drawing, paper-plane-flying contests…some of us started the new Netflix series “Wednesday,” (Can’t wait to get to land and download more episodes!)We’ve enjoyed the full-moon light at night, illuminating even the interior of the boat with incredible intensity. When partly cloudy skies clear, they boast a clarity of starlight as well. While the Atlantic crossing was so dark we could see the Milky Way spray against the sky, the stars were slightly out of focus due to moisture particles in the air (bigger seas and waves). This week they are in focus, seemingly. read more...

Renegade - Leg 1, Days 3-4

It's 04:00 on day 4 and I have the watch while Julie and Peter get some rest.I have good wind at 15-20 kts.It's been from the east all day, but there is a rain cloud sneaking up behind me right now and pushing it southeast.Not a problem at all, the boat needs a rinse.There's a big container ship on the horizon that will pass about 2 miles ahead of us, fairly close by ocean standards. We had some excitement yesterday just before sunset.We were sailing wing and wing with the genoa poled out on the opposite side from the mainsail.I wanted to switch sides, moving genoa over to port and main to starboard, so we can make more progress south.This maneuver is complicated by the pole, which has to be taken down and then set up on the other side, and we only had a short time before sunset.Peter. read more...

Mistral of Portsmouth - Day 3 - 480 nm to go

Another peaceful night. The wind dropped and we moved quietly across the Caribbean Sea at 5.5 to 7 knots through the night. The moon is still quite full so good visibility, a star covered sky and clouds easy to see. We continue with our sail plan of 3 white sails goose-winged so the wind can push us forward.Today is a special day as it’s Jane’s 60th birthday. I managed to deck the saloon with some balloons at 4am after my watch and we had a freshly made lemon drizzle cake for Jane’s birthday cake along with a celebratory drink of Canarian rum - we have marked the occasion and will celebrate in style in Santa Marta. Jane is still not feeling 100% so she’s putting a brave face on it all. The last place you want to be when you’re feeling poorly is the middle of the ocean on a boat!Today we. read more...

Mistral of Portsmouth - Day 2 - 164 miles completed; 680 miles to go

I am pleased to report a quiet night! Chris was SSB radio controller last night - he made contact with11 boats … everyone is still fairly close together and all reported a good first day.Jane had prepared a delicious cottage pie eaten with a glorious sun set as the backdrop. Our watch system started with Tim & Jane at 7pm. We are doing 3 x 3 hour watch rotation. So far so good except that Jane is still feeling poorly and no amount of beechams powders, paracetamol and strepsils are working. Bed rest is the order of the day.The morning boat inspection revealed just one flying fish - sails,lines, bolts and split pins all appear to be in working order - thank goodness! A couple of small rain showers in the night with mostly 13 to 18 knots of wind and a 2m swelll - fabulous sailing and. read more...