Daily Logs

Nikajuma - Day 6 - 1300 nm to go

A dayof breakage followed ba a day of fixing. We go back one day. Friday was also at work the day, when things went wrong. As a sailor, luckily there is no weekend. Start of failure was 6 a.m. utc. Pitch dark. Our sail just crashed into the water. Result may be due to a broken block. Midday. Shakle got loose on genua. Afternoon: water in motor bilge. Luckily fresh water. Nighttime: we ripped out 2 blocks due to a jam with a towel. Easy to see in daytime... But good news exept the sail, everything is fixed again. Resulting in a saturday with no big highlights. But looking at the good things of a lost friday: we had boats around us (Selkie and Damasi II) on AIS and in sight. This gives a lot of confidence. And we got a new speed record surfing down the giant waves. Good night.. read more...

Rush - Day 7 - News from Summer and Louis

Hi hi Summer here,It is day 7 We are almost half way there, yay!! ;-) it rained today but we saw a double rainbow, But mummy got soaked with all the rain. We got to have Oreos at 10:40 am :D I read a bit of my book. I helped make lunch (that means I sat there eating my lunch watching Hannah and Louis making the lunch) me Hannah and Louis played 2 3 4 player games (2 3 4 player games is an game with lots of little games in it) me and Louis played sailor ted and slothy.So yeah it was a pretty nice day Summer out Hello, louis here,Day 7: nearing the halfway mark! Bit rough in the morning but it cleared up over time. Me and Hannah cooked eggs, bacon and baguettes for lunch. While mummy and i were on watch, a squall loomed in the background, as it came closer we could see the sea becoming. read more...

Moonflower 3 - Atlantic Bakeoff

P {margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0;} The team recreated British Bakeoff yesterday evening - Atlantic addition - Chloe and Emma concocting a delicious “pineapple bottom jeans cake”, which definitely did not fall on the floor twice. Another bright moonlit night as we head further West, and yet another flying fish incident with Carrie on the helm. Rumours that the flying fish are specifically targeting Miss Cushion have not been confirmed, but the team have taken it as a good omen as wecontinue to climb up the field. 2000 miles to go! A game is a foot. O captain my captain. Until tomorrow,Lots of love, Your Moonflowersxxxxxx. read more...

Suffisant - Day 5, 6

Keine besonderen Vorkommnisse an Bord am 26.11.2020. Alles ist fit und munter. Der Wachplan funktioniert, im 4stuendigen Rhythmus. Tagsüber kann man auch alleine oben sein und nachts sind immer 2 Personen draussen.Am 27.11. hat es nachts auf den 28.11. zum ersten Mal die isolierten Regenfronten gegeben. Angekündigt werden diese zuerst mit einer fast Stille, dann rauscht im Blätterwald, sprich in den Segeln. Wir haben eingerefft. Windböen von teils 24 Knoten und dann Regen. So wird das Deck sauber gehalten.Gestern brachte ich zum Teil 7.2 bis 9.3 Knoten raus, zurück zu führen auf die Boen. Sonst im Durchschnitt 5.2 Knoten, manchmal mehr, manchmal weniger. Was Solls. Im Rennen ist lediglich noch die Pogo 30, ein Flitzer, der auch weit vorne liegt. Wir mit 33 Füssen können gar nicht. read more...

Escapado - 28th November Skippers report

After a slow start today without the use of the spin pole as we scratched our heads trying to work out why it wouldn’t hold, we headed further south. Then gybed, hoisted our young Scotsman Tom up the forestay, we all watched him sway from side to side at such a great height in the ocean swell whilst he quickly retrieved the pole up line and a spin halyard.Then with a plan for the pole, up went the symmetric with the guy lashed to the pole so there was no escaping should the jaw ping open again!And we were off! Escapado roared through the building swell at speeds of 14.8kts! Everyone including Escapado were euphoric! Almighty cheers from us all, smiles were so wide as we laughed at this wonderful moment. The sun was setting, big cumulous clouds around had a deep red reflecting through. read more...

Escapado - 27th November Skippers Report

The North Atlantic stars are out! I’m always amazed by their brilliance. Of the oceans I’ve crossed or sailed in, these stars are some of the sparkliest!  We ripped the asymmetric early on and whilst we had a superb 24 hours flying the symmetric through the night the pole has been keeping us on our toes with the release mechanism spontaneously opening. The colourful symmetric jerks round behind the main with its free flying guy pressing on the forestay.  These crew haven’t flown spinnakers before, so each time I’m calling for them to pull on the lazy guy for a drop and not the tack of the kite which could whisk them into the air has meant my heart raced a few times! So I’m repeatedly teaching the lazy guy and it’s improving! We’ve had many bare-headed drops because of. read more...

Escapado - 27th November

Today we made our first trip up the mast at sea to retrieve the pole up and spinnaker halyard which popped early in the morning. Tom was hoisted up the forestay with 16 knots of wind and the full crew on deck to make sure he was safe, be reassured that the procedure went very smoothly with Tom only completing a couple of pirouettes. While we prepared pesto pasta and GB (garlic bread - named by Eddie) we were joined by a beautiful pod of dolphins fully leaping out the sea at sunset. All was too good to be true... successful spinnaker hoist, dolphins, good wind, pasta in the pan... 15 minuets later, half way through a bowl of steaming pasta while Charlie and Alister were controlling the power behind the big blue kite. The wind began to pick up. “Spinnaker drop” screamed our skipper Sophie,. read more...

Escapado - 26th November

Were all still in hysterics, after Eddies attempt at sleeping in the pipe cot at 2am. 14 hours later and we’re gathered in the galley still chuckling along at the image of 6”4’ Eddie head first with his legs sticking out towards the nav table, completely stuck, half asleep while Tom is yanking his ankles to try and free him, ‘like birthing a lamb’ says Sophie. meanwhile crew ‘watch out’ are spectating in uncontrollable fits of laughter while Eddie is wedged half in and half out the cot. Still paralysed with laughter we couldn’t even move to take a photo or video of the scene. Despite the crews frustration of the spinnaker pole jaws breaking we’re all very much in good spirit, especially after Eddie and Tom's comedy sketch. We crept into 3rd place this morning however we’re still chasing. read more...

Escapado - 25th November

With predicted stronger winds and bigger waves of 4.5m coming tomorrow so we made the most of the calmer conditions before getting stuck into some exciting sailing! We spent the day with the jib poled out on windward while taking reefs in and out on the main sheet. We’re split into two watch stystems so we spend most of our time with four crew, team ‘watch out’ being myself (Iona), Tom, Charlie and Alister And team ‘ ‘ being Jake, kat, Eddie and donato. We catch the others briefly on change overs but eat and operate separately, making what seemed like a complete squeeze of 9 people in Las Palmas completely manageable as there is only 4-5 crew on deck or down below (probably sleeping) Our shifts are split with two 6 hour shifts during the day and three 4 hour shifts at night on a rotating. read more...

Veni Vidi Vixi - Veni Vidi Vixi - second blog

Introducing Veni Vidi Vixi and her jolly crew...Veni Vidi Vixi = I came, I saw, I lived - not conquered like Julias Cesar, but lived like the poem written by Victor Hugo whilst he was exiled in Guernsey - a little island that is close to our hearts as our three children were born there during a overseas stint early on in Paul’s legal career. Before the children, came love found in on a dance floor in London where the stars aligned for Kiwi Paul and Canadian Robin. Since falling head over heels for each other there have been travelling adventures all over the globe and all the while Paul had an idea for an ultimate family adventure - to buy a yacht in Croatia, spend a summer lazily exploring the Mediterranean then spend two years sailing through the Caribbean, down the Panama Canal to the. read more...

Rush - Day 6 - What a difference a day makes!

Another busy day!First we had an unorthodox sail change that went a little something like this:- Furl code 5- Fish strike the second it’s furled- Alan catches his first fish (more on that later)- Ian has rather amusing wrestling match with said fish on aft deck, thank goodness for the ‘child catcher’ (a webbing dodger we have across the transom for safety)- Sailor Ted found chilling out in spinnaker bag with his new friend, the sloth.- Big yellow spinnaker up- Alan skins and fillets his first fishSince Alan caught his first fish it’s grown in both length and weight many times, surprising that we managed to land it really ;-) He had his first lesson in skinning and filleting the fish and did a great job. We’ve just eaten some of it for dinner which was a joint effort with yours truly. read more...

Tohuwabohu - leg 2 day 5

It’s my birthday and it was lovely to wake at 6 am to Holger and Simone singing happy birthday and in the saloon area was cake and candles. They both had very thoughtfully brought me a picture print of an original Cape Verde male at a celebration, this photo certainly captures our stay in Mindelo with its vibrant African heritage, people and culture. Although the stop in Cape Verde was longer than expected, it shows a different side to life, people, poverty and society. Today was a good day for sailing we had some great wind, until the auto pilot stopped working suddenly and for no apparent reason (tinkering possibly) however this has meant that we are now having to steer the remaining 1600 miles by hand and so a change of shift has Come into play 2x2x2 (this works well for me as I don’t. read more...

Montana - Blog Montana

A very special year, just like 10 or 15 years ago. Just 57 boats in the ARC. It’s family style. But nevertheless everything is different. Because of Corona gathering with just 10 people is allowed and we have to wear masks. No Sundowner’s, no Parties. Seminars are held over Zoom, watched on a iPad and board speakers. The German fleet is small just 3 boats + Manfred with Albatros. Weather looks good for the start, with trade winds right away. But on the Start day it’s very light and on the nose. We doing good at the start and after 10 min. We are third in our start groups. But then most of the boats start the engine to find the wind behind Gran Canaria. We doing it too late and have to trail the pack. The old and wise guy’s turn to the west right after Gran Canaria. We go a bit more. read more...

Jubilate Mare - Day 6 - Fabulous Friday

Hi to everyone reading this and sorry for thesilence - it's not often that I'm at a loss for words.   Our crew have settled into life as afamily and we are  (mostly!) a happy boat. Sharing one's home with formerstrangers is always a bit of a leap of faith!  Yesterday the jib furling linechafed in two places (the boys don't know why yet) and had to beknotted together as an emergency measure, then replaced. This all, fortunately,happened just before dark. But it was a great team-building exercise.On the plus side we had a large pod of porpoises playaround us for a long time during Happy Hour  - which was a perfect endto what had been otherwise quite a stressful day for me.  The water maker is working  well and asusual meals are a. read more...

Moonflower 3 - Good afternoon from Team Moonflower!

P {margin-top:0;margin-bottom:0;} Good afternoon from Team Moonflower!Our tactic is paying off - we have shot up since our last update and hope to continue making moves up the field. Alex and James had their debut in the kitchen last night, whipping up a mushroom risotto and destroying half the galley in the process. Their sealegs are not quite there yet.We were treated to breath taking stars last night with a fire red setting moon. There is something uniquely magical about these quiet nights alone on the ocean. The peace was shattered at 2am when Carrie was hit whilst at the helm by a flying fish, which thenlanded and flapped around on deck before we finally managed to return it to the sea. More updates tomorrow,Lots of love,Your Moonflowers xxxxxx. read more...

Ydalir II - Blog Day 4 Ydalir cross-Atlantic

Windy and very bumpy night. Now UTC 13:00 Position N 15'51 W33'57Still 25-30 knots wind with 35-40 in gusts.Smaller genoa and reefed main 7-9 knots.All well on board. Nilla is serving her boat made youghurt with müsli and fresh passion fruit from Mindelo.  . read more...

Suffisant - Day 5 - 26.11.2020

Wir fahren zwischen zwei Fronten durch. Sind nicht von den Stürmen betroffen, haben jedoch teils Starkwind bis 24 Knoten. Die Kiste läuft. Auch die Regenwolken verschonen uns und manchmal gibts eine quereinfallende Welle, die uns etwas duscht.Wir sind soweit zufrieden, wir messen jeden Tag für das Covidprotokoll die Temperatur und sind bis heute alle clean.Uns tuen die 3 Boote leid, bei welchen scheinbar Covid aufgetreten sein sollte. Von einem Boot weiss ich, dass keiner Fieber oder sonstige Symptome aufweist.Zeigt mir doch mal aufgrund einer mikroskopischen Fotoaufnahme das Covid. Bis heute bekamen wir nur eine computergezeichnete Form zu sehen…Lg MarinaPS gestern Abend gab es Pilzschnitte zum Essen.. read more...

Cloudy Bay - 26 Nov: Fast sailing and more fish

Two more days of fast sailing with the code 0 and second reef have gone by. Last night we changed to goose wing settings due to the forecasted wind and direction. The first few hours it felt a little bit like a wrong decision,because we sailed “just” around 5 to6 knots. However, later in the night and morning we were back to our new normal an beloved 6 to 8 knots.I had the shift with the sunrise and because the last two days we didn’t catch any fish I decided to throw out the lure around 7am. Not expecting to catch anything (soon) and wanting to take a nap... BUT... 15 minutes later the line went pfffrrrrrrr!!! Before Sanne even had the chance to drink her coffee, we were busy reeling in a big Mahi Mahi. It was a beautiful 85 cm fish! So, at 0730 we were fileting our long wanted fish. read more...

For Tuna - Log 2 - Day 10

Hello Sailors,Fishcount: 7 - we managed to reel in 5 mahi mahi and two tunas;) Still eating fresh fish and even conserved some tuna in olive oil. As wind and waves picked up we decided to pause fishing for now and are well on route with an average of 6.9 knots and all sails max reefed.Today we celebrated Gretas Birthday with some freshly baked sacher cake and finished the day with pizza - our Autopilot was named Oskar and since then is able to cope better with the heavy waves. During the day we hand steered a lot as we were surfing the waves with a max speed of 14.5 knots. the waves still can’t decide what to do so every now and then they throw us out of bed (literally!) or bath us in saltwater:)Salty wishes from For TunaMichael. read more...

Ydalir II - Blog Ydalir Cross Atlantic Day 3 Nov 26

Position UTC 20:29 Nov 26: N 16’ 19”; W 32’ 27”.Yesterday at sunset we caught a gold mackerel cira 2 kg, which provided a tasty lunch today. We sailed through the night in increasing and turning winds, which brought us a more northenly course than planned, as we wanted to wait for daylight before we gybed. Today we have sailed on 210 degrees, to keep pressure in the sails in the somewhat strong wind and a bit rough sea. WInd 20-30 knots with gusts close to 40 and 3 m wavesNilla impressed by baking a choclate cake despite the rocky sail. Now tonight, at least for the moment the wind is 20-25 knots and the sea a bit kinder. We hope it will last during the night. We are uncertain if our Blog Day 2 got through, but yesterday was truly an awsome day at sea, with Atlantic spotted dolphins. read more...

Rush - Day 5 - All sorts happening!

Been a big 24hrs here on Rush with one thing and another.After an epic day yesterday surfing with 3 reefs and code 5 the breeze and sea built quite considerably and so at Midnight we switched to a slow but safe mode with 3 reefs and the Solent which we’ve had most of the day. Have just swapped back to the code 5 with a general trend down in breeze with an average 17-22kn. Sea is annoyingly still quite big with the odd wave set that can be quite awkward in throwing our big wide transom around. We’ve had some big ones land on deck from all angles including straight through the transom. We are looking forward to the seas trending down a bit through tomorrow, makes a big difference for our particular hull shape at this wind and wave angle. For now we are short shifting on the hand steering. read more...

Kaizen - Making new friends across across the airwaves

We have been participating in the ARC SSB net everyday. The net is where boats fitted with SSB (long range radios), call in at set times twice a day to announce any problems and to share information such as weather. Dangers like the coordinates of migrant boats and abandoned fishing boats adrift have also been shared on the net over the past days. Captain acts as one of the SSB net controllers which means he kicks off the call at the appropriate time and moderates the conversation, so that all boats get an opportunity to talk. Today, we learnt from the net that another boat, Songbird of London, had seen a large pod of Minke Whales which stayed with them for 45 minutes last night. So we moved today’s classroom upstairs. Alas - no whales for us...yet.image1. read more...

Khelios - Khelios, day 5, time to figure it out

Imagine you are living in a 45 sqm space where you cannot go out for the next 15 days. Same view all day long. Constant noise. No possibility to go out shopping - if you forgot your favorite candy bar, too bad for you ! You have to live with 5 other persons you enjoy being with, but maybe not 24/7. If you are going out of this space, definitely you put not only yourself at risk but also all the other folks as well. Netflix is down and internet is working too poorly to even find the word “work” relevant. But anyway you will have to wake up every 4h to ensure your safety.Some call it heaven, some call it hell. Some call it freedom, some think it is the exact opposite of it. Some dream for it while some can’t wait for it to end. Some call it a sailing boat, some call it lockdown.I believe. read more...

Jubilate Mare - Wednesday - Day 4

After a spectacular night where the whole crew stayed upto watch the stars and the phosphorescence, the day dawned breezy.  Justthe time then to set up wing and wing and dead downwind.  Not quitepointing at St Lucia, but hey, Cape Town is close, isn't it?   The journey always seems slow at this stage, when theCanaries are still very much on the charts, and St Lucia is way off theleft-hand side. But the average speed tells the story.   A minor disaster just before dark when a brand-newfurling line chafed through in two places, but a bit of ingenious knittingby Tom & Pete soon had it fixed.  We left the sail plan light for thenight as we were expecting 25-30 knots.  But even that reduced area gave us6 or so all night long.   We have travelled for. read more...

Moonflower 3 - Hello from Moonflower 3

Blog post: 26/11/2020Subject: Hello from Moonflower 3Greetings friends and family from the Moonflower 3 crew! We are in high spirits, despite considerable sea sickness from James and Alex on day 1, and some sail issues, which we’ve overcome with sheer grit and duct tape. We have a broken satellite internet box (meaning we cannot check weather or race position). This has unsurprisingly made racing the Atlantic even more challenging, but we are making do and the Sat Wifi company has kindly given us our own meteorologist who will be checking in with us daily to update us on our course and the weather. A note to family and friends: we cannot receive email, but if you receive a call from a +88 number, it is likely us calling to update you. We have been heading steadily south at 6 - 7 Notts as. read more...

Suffisant - Day 4

Der Wetterbericht von Chris Tips stimmt bei uns überein. In der Nacht (25. auf 26.11.) gab es Winde bis 22 Knoten und Wellen mit rund 3-4 m.Der Strom läuft bei 0.2 Knoten mit. Das Boot hält sich gut und ist bei Böen 2x aus dem Ruder gelaufen. Wir haben das Reff 2 gesetzt und die Genua nur wenig rausgelassen. Teilweise hatte. Ich über 7 Knoten auf der Logge. Zur Zeit herrschen Winde von 15-22 Knoten, Himmel bewölkt. Die isolierten Showers, hatte wir ebenfalls, aber nicht als regen oh nein, diese kamen in Form einer querlaufenden Welle reingeklatscht.Wir sind nun überhalb der Cap Verden und steuern Richtung 230-240 Grad, so dass wir dann die Passatwinde nach den Cap Verden erwischen. Für nur 10m Länge und 9.50m Wasserlinie läuft das kleine Ding gut.Delphine oder Wale haben wir keine. read more...

Tohuwabohu - Leg 2 Day 4

As I write this blog it’s a beautiful day and the sun is shining, I, not sure what the weather is doing where you are, but rest assured if it’s not sunny and dry it is somewhere else in the world.For yesterdays evening entertainment we snapped the code 0 or spinnaker halyard at the top of the mast, throwing our code 0 into the 5000 metres of seawater below, acting like a huge dragging anchor. The sound of snapping and bending seems to be a daily occurrence, I can assure any readers it wasn’t bad preparation. It appears that the culprit for this little incident is chafe/chaff. Anyway, however it’s spelt, the rubbing of fabric and metal eventually means we gathered the very wet sail on board and now have new task to rig a new/old halyard inside the mast to get the code 0 up and running. I. read more...

Tohuwabohu - Leg 2 day 3

Firstly apologies for the lack of updates, I think there was a technical glitch on my emails which meant that the email system, satellite phone etc wasn’t working and we have been without communications for the last few days.I must admit sailing with the forecast for the next few days was ok however I was concerned that I couldn’t get any further updates from John R who is our uk weather router! As I mentioned in a previous blog this is a German/English boat and it appears that a new language is developing. We have been able to signal to each other about various different tasks, I’ll try and explain in a key below (Imagine the sound)Peep peep - mobile phone alarm Drip - small leak Drip drip - bigger Leak Drip drip drip (repeated quickly) - serious leak Wiggle wiggle - move over Woggle. read more...

Nikajuma - Day 3 - 1750 nm to go

The stars are waving us. The moon and our toplight are shining. White glitter is following us on the waves. Its so good to be on nightshift. Just finished "the old man and the sea".I always liked Hemingway. You can feel between the lines that he was also a man of the sea.. read more...

Peter von Seestermühe - Bericht1,Mittwoch 25.Nov.

Nach einem relativ flauen Start in Las Palmas, flau war sowohl der Wind als auch das Gefühl im Magen, kreuzten wir zunächst die ersten Meilen hoch am Wind. Wir, das sind der Skipper der Peter v. Seestermühe Christoph, sowie Hanneke, Maj, Monja, Frank, Uwe, Siggi, Jochen, Klaus und Claudius. Sobald wir Gran Canaria den Rücken gekehrt hatten, steuerten wir in Süd-westlicher Richtung in einen atemberaubenden Sonnen-untergang hinein, der den Himmel in allen erdenklichen Rottönen erstrahlen ließ. Schnell gewöhnten wir uns an den Wachwechsel und das nächtliche Dahingleiten im Mondschein. Bei lauen Temperaturen reicht nachts nur eine dünne Jacke gegen den Wind zu den Segelshorts. Am 2. Tag hörten wir über UKW Funk von der Sichtung eines besetzten Flüchtlingsbootes, kreuzten wir doch die. read more...

Escapado - Day 3 - 24 November

Our early morning watches consisted of ups and downs... the ups being Charlie’s banging scrambled eggs, avocados, and toast while the struggles were hoisting the spinnaker in the dark, unsuccessfully. The rest of the day was spent re-attempting to hoist the spinnaker, fixing a winch, rigging a new reefing pully system and Jake's heroic ability to fix just about anything with Donato led us to have a now functioning spinnaker pole. As a result, we successfully hoisted the spinnaker in the early evening boosting morale and (hopefully) enabling us to close the gap between us and rainmaker. The day was topped off by Kats amazing chips and guac, eaten over sunset.. read more...

Kaizen - Winding our way through the waves

Day 4: The waves have certainly built and become "lively". Approx 3 meters at 6 second intervals. With 20-22 knots of wind gusting 27 knots, we have put in an early reef on both our headsails as we expect the weather to continue to build into midnight. The kids are kept mostly inside doing homes-chooling and watching movies whilst Captain still insists on maintaining his two showers a day routine. With the grace and elegance of a slinky, I had to leave the cockpit to retrieve a dangling fender off the stern quarter. My coffee also bid for freedom and flew across the kitchen earlier, so I suspect cooking lunch is going to be a battle - I need octopus arms.Average speed over the last 4 hours: 8.5kts If we continue at this pace, we'll have our first 200nm day of the passage!Kaizen-photo. read more...

Rush - Day 4 - Sailor Ted Makes Banana Bread

Before we left Gran Canaria we visited ‘Spaceman Dan’, a very old friend who runs a surf school and lives in the hills. He gave us loads of home grown fruit and veg, including some amazing and very green bananas for us to eat during our crossing. We also duly went to the fruit and veg market and bought more ‘even greener’ bananas. Today every single banana went overripe all at once and at risk of us all turning yellow/being extremely regular we have been eating them like crazy. Sailor Ted decided his contribution would be to help make banana bread, the smell of which just woke me up 90 minutes before my watch! Aside from that all is well onboard Rush. In anticipation of today’s increasing breeze and swell forecast we took it easy overnight and sailed nice and gently with mainsail only at. read more...