Daily Logs

Pauline af Skanor - Logbok 3/12 dag 12

Position: 18°16.0’N, 50°35.5 ’WDatum: 3 decemberTrip: 2572 NMTid: 14.00 (Pauline time, GMT-3, ja det stämmer, vi har ställt om en timme till!)Hej där hemma! Efter ett litet avbrott i de ”vanliga loggarna” undrar ni säkert vad vi hittat på de senaste två dagarna – ska jag vara ärlig så är det egentligen inte så jättemycket. Vi har guppat på här ute på havet och rört oss sakta men säkert närmare St Lucia, ni kanske har följt oss i appen? Vi har det fortsatt bra, stämningen är god och det är vi tacksamma för! Att vi numera ser vårt mål på kartan, och inte längre varken Gran Canaria, Kap Verde eller endast hav är en väldigt härlig känsla kan jag lova. Nedräkningen är påbörjad och den kvarstående distansen till mållinjen är i skrivande stund ”ynka” 660 NM. Denna sträcka kan vi ta oss i mål på. read more...

Walkabout - Walkabout - It Ain't Over 'til the Fat Lady Sings - Day15 Mindelo to Grenada

N11:59.5 W60:45.6Just when you think you are cruising in to the finish, and everything is good in the world.Having a bit of a chat with Morgane of Sark on the VHF - and it all goes to rats.The Blue Water Runner that has been driving us towards Grenada for the last 30 hours decide to separate itself from the top furler.The whole thing slid down the torsion rope and very nearly into the drink.Luckily Traci noticed the problem very quickly, and we dashed on deck to try to sort the mess out.The sail is unusable without getting the torsion rope back in place - looks like we will need a tennis court or something to lay it all out and get it put back together - so no more BWR on this trip.The cause of the problem - our old friend, and jogger’s nemesis - chafe. The attachment line worn right. read more...

Walkabout - Walkabout - It Ain't Over 'til the Fat Lady Sings - Day15 Mindelo to Grenada

N11:59.5 W60:45.6Just when you think you are cruising in to the finish, and everything is good in the world.Having a bit of a chat with Morgane of Sark on the VHF - and it all goes to rats.The Blue Water Runner that has been driving us towards Grenada for the last 30 hours decide to separate itself from the top furler.The whole thing slid down the torsion rope and very nearly into the drink.Luckily Traci noticed the problem very quickly, and we dashed on deck to try to sort the mess out.The sail is unusable without getting the torsion rope back in place - looks like we will need a tennis court or something to lay it all out and get it put back together - so no more BWR on this trip.The cause of the problem - our old friend, and jogger’s nemesis - chafe. The attachment line worn right. read more...

Mary Doll - Day 9 - Happy Birthday Big Sis (wish you were here!)

When my alarm went off this morning just before midnight I was seriously ready to drop kick it out my cabin window and consign that horrid honking noise, that is the default iPhone alarm sound, to the bottom of the Atlantic - seriously, who thought that noise was appropriate for waking someone up?! Steve Jobs,, have a word… I emerged onto deck to find Letitia and my Dad already on duty having been roused to deal with some inclement weather just after they went down to bed, they incredibly kindly said that I could go back to bed as they had the situation in hand. The guilty feeling of skiving a shift evaporated pretty quickly as I crawled back into bed, you’ll be glad to hear…Averaging 6 hours of sleep a night was beginning to bring out ‘grumpy Lewis’, so perhaps the squall was a blessing. read more...

Mary Doll - Day 9 - Stormy Reflections

The storm continues. Overnight the winds calmed to lows of around 20mph. A high of 59mph was seen on our screen by Caroline - I suspect that it went a lot higher than that. When we get the big gusts, looking at the screens is not always the first thing on my mind.The storm reminded us of sailing in Scotland, and on St Andrews day too. Letitia magicked up a saltire and some bunting to celebrate the day. You can maybe imagine the scenes as we tried to set them all up while the good ship Mary Doll rolled around in all directions, then tried to get a decent photo on the iPad. After a few failed attempts and a lot of laughs a moment of calm descended for the perfect???? photo (I think we were all keen to agree that it was perfect so that we could move on). Finally, before the bunting was. read more...

Mary Doll - Day 9 - Stormy Reflections

The storm continues. Overnight the winds calmed to lows of around 20mph. A high of 59mph was seen on our screen by Caroline - I suspect that it went a lot higher than that. When we get the big gusts, looking at the screens is not always the first thing on my mind.The storm reminded us of sailing in Scotland, and on St Andrews day too. Letitia magicked up a saltire and some bunting to celebrate the day. You can maybe imagine the scenes as we tried to set them all up while the good ship Mary Doll rolled around in all directions, then tried to get a decent photo on the iPad. After a few failed attempts and a lot of laughs a moment of calm descended for the perfect???? photo (I think we were all keen to agree that it was perfect so that we could move on). Finally, before the bunting was. read more...

Into The Mystic - Food For Thought

As commented previously thanks to Jodi we have eaten really well onboard during our sojourn across the Atlantic.Today we go out bows firmly pointed towards St Lucia - no more flim-flamming around for us - one day pointing towards Florida and the next day Brazil. Its dead straight for the finish line which os currently some 900-odd miles away. To celebrate we indulged ourselves with a dinner of steak frites. As Henry commented : ‘I have never eaten cow so far from the nearest cow !’ - ho does have a point. Speaking of Henry. We share all our special food treats on this boat - we have large drawer full of them and lots of chocolate goodies in the fridge. It helps to ease the struggle of those night watches. Well, it seems we all share except for Henry. With shock and horror we discovered. read more...

Morgane of Sark - our last full night at the ocean

Hi there, we just enrolled in our final nightly watche schedule! We hope to be in Grenada tomorrow night around this hour. We are getting excited to arrive and are ready for some “land life “ again.But, a lot to tell about the life on the Morgane of Sark on the ocean since our last log yesterday afternoon. Herco caught a tuna fish yesterday evening right before dusk. He hadn’t been fishing because of the waves, but yesterday afternoon it eased a bit, so he gave it one more try. Witha fat tuna fish as a result, guess around 3 kilos. Tasted delicious! Tomorrow the other half!We continued the pup quiz with guys of Sandy Cay late afternoon. They were still within 10 miles. We lost the battle…. So, drinks are on us in Grenada. It was a lot of fun, playing the pup quiz on the VHF like this, in. read more...

Tilda - Gender equality on board

Yes, Tilda is a very equal boat if we consider gender: the crew is composed by 3 men (plus Captain Fabri) and 3 women and all duties are perfectly shared. Same hours at the helm, same hours on watch, same duties for cooking, cleaning and rig checks. Of course there are some “natural preferences” in everyone: Rui and João are more fond of night shifts (during which they stare at the stars and sing in duet Portuguese love songs), Iva is very precise in her checks, either for food stocks or for rigging, Francy takes care of communication (VHF is her favorite chat-line and this blog is written by her), Ale is the best at the helm in every condition and our super jolly in the galley is Matteo, delighting us with two fresh and healthy meals per day. We are sorry that we won’t win the ARC (at. read more...

Time Out - Day 13 - Spi vers l’Ouest

Ter repetita : nuit orageuse et lendemain qui chante, on s’habitue. Le soleil du matin est resté cette fois toute la journée, les vagues sont descendues à 2,5 m, nous avons déjeuné à table dehors, on revit.Puis la journée commence selon un scénario un peu identique à celui de la veille : nous apercevons derrière nous au lever, un nouveau voisin, qui se rapproche : c’est Sam, un quillard de 38 pieds seulement (hier c’était Rupella, un magnifique ketch de 55 pieds -merci Denis). 38 pieds, aux standards de l’Arc, c’est un bébé, une sardine, un microbe… Et pourtant, il gagne du terrain!Il faut dire que suite à la nuit un peu mouvementée, nous étions un peu endormis. Qu’à cela ne tienne, nous sortirons le spi! Les conditions sont idéales, soleil, mer moins formée, ciel clair, vent arrière. read more...

Sunrise - ARC2021 - Day #13 on the SUNRISE

We have a taylormade watch keeping schedule on SUNRISE for this voyage.During our pre-journey video conference this was an important issue.Being eight in total we agreed on forming four teams of two.After some discussion on different options: - a fixed watch schedule in which each crew member wakes up at the same time every night for his watch, so the organism can adapt more easily to a regular sleep rhythm; - a shifting watch schedule in which the time slots revolve every day and each crew member gets to stand all the different watches during one cycle;we finally agreed on the second one, because it distributes the highlights of the day and the unpleasant moments equally among all crew members. Four watches also give us enough time to socialise as a group of friends. During the night. read more...

Maalu IV - Day 13 Culinary Catastrophes!

Maalu IV bristles with navigational aides and I havestruggled to keep up with a similar level of cooking aides in the galley. Myright hand aide is Ninja or 'The Ninj' as he has becomeaffectionately known. He is an electric multi-cooker who can pressure cook,steam, saute, bake, roast, grill, air fry and even make yoghurt! He lookssomething like a cross between Henry the Hoover and a Cyberman. He has added 11kg of weight to the boat but has been worth every gram. Nicholas was persuadedto build him a Ninja Cave so he even has a cosy home in the main cabinwhere he can rest or cook depending on the sea state. If it is calm he isallowed out and can be seen cooking on the saloon floor! He has kept us verywell fed with a minimum of effort and very little washing up so he has become. read more...

Cajuna - J+14 : la machine à laver se calme…un peu

Journée studieuse, salon de lecture pour tout le monde. Il fait chaud, on a du mal à boire autant que l’on transpire (ça doit en faire rêver certains-es). Nous commençons à sentir l’odeur de l’écurie. Il nous reste un peu plus de 480 nm à parcourir. Si le vent est avec nous, ce qui sembleêtre le cas d’après la météo, ça devrait se faire en moins de 4 jours. Tout va bien à bord. A+. read more...

Tamanaco - Broken again!

After a great great day with the code Zero (see my last blog) during happy hour we heard « pop » and saw the sail fly into the water next to the boat.We quickly retrieved the Code and bagged it.It turns out it’s the exact same failure of the top swivel we experienced with our gennaker on day 3.Upon inspection looks like a poor design (yes, I AM a mechanical engineer) The guys from Selden, the manufacturer, will be hearing from me! We finished our happy hour, allowing ourselves a second beer for the trouble, and reverted to the sail configuration from yesterday, with the jib poledout.Lost about a knot of speed, bummer!In the morrow, weather permitting, we will hoist the Code Zero without using the furlin system, which will require some special skills to retrieve, but worth it to maintain. read more...

Calash - Day 12 – Thursday 2 December 2021

 As was the trend, Colin & Callum’s watch bore no resemblance to the first watch.  They had winds up to 35 knots and very confused and lumpy seas.  Things turned dramatic at about 0300 hrs, when a huge wave breached the rear of the boat, soaking both of them, drowning the fresh vegetables and whooshing through the open deck portholes to soak both rear cabins, its contents and poor Jamie who endured the full waterfall effect!  This is not quite what we had in mind for an open deck jacuzzi, but I guess we need to be a little more specific in our specification for the next shooting star!  Thankfully, everything was just wet and no damage or injury.  Jamie and I sprung to action as the Emergency Response Team, with underpants securely fitted over our shorts, rapidly arriving onsite. read more...

Emily Morgan - Day 12 - Boat talk

Thursday 2nd December Noon position (Ship's time) 19 degrees 39 minutes North; 0042 degrees 34 minutes WestAnother night and day of squalls and rough, confused seas, apparently, unusual for this time of year. By this time all the crew have unqualified faith in Emily Morgan's capability to bring us safely to the Caribbean. The boat has demonstrated her ability to cleave her way through the mountainous seas and deal with rogue beam-on waves and squalls with occasional Force 10 gusts in a competent, methodical manner. We are delighted to be doing our transatlantic passage in this strong, robust, full-keel matriarch of the oceans. She has already taken Anna and Bones safely on a circumnavigation across the Indian Ocean and Pacific Ocean and this is their 13th Atlantic crossing. (One. read more...

Blake - hello mainsail

Several days back with a triple reefed main we managed to catch the top batten in the shrouds and when bringing the sails down it put a tear in the luff of the mainsail, probably a 2ft strip where the bolt rope was ripped off the sail and still attached to the sliders.Bit annoying but it meant we were just under jib for the heavier weather/squalls, probably not a bad thing as easier and quicker to reef the jib in and out.We finally had some time on calmer seas, about an hour yesterday and another 2-3 hours this morning, to make some repairs.With some yellow sail repair tape and some Frankenstein stitching we were able to get a pretty good hold.Nice to get the mainsail back up and put in a touch more boat speed.Working on some paper chains and snowflakes to add to the festive decorations. read more...

Tamanaco - wing on wing sailing

This morning the wind was a little less, in high teens and with a friendly sky.Before Tony was up we decided to hoist the Code Zero, which is a large front sail.We rolled in the main completely, adjusted the poled-out job on starboard and used the main sail boom I. Lieu of a pole on port, to stabilize the Code Zero sheet, without which it would be much too close to the side of the boat and ineffective.Our average speed has shot up +1.5 knots, and we feel the full power of the wind moving the boat.Exhilarating.I just helmed for the last hour and a half and it was a blast!Of course we should have done this a few days sooner and we’d be closer to the top spot in 1E category by now. But we had other issues.Oh boy.At least we should be in for a strong finish.Heading is good.image1. read more...

Khamsin - Khamsin Day 15

I’ve been mulling over awards the Arc Plus might want to consider: steepest learning curve, amount of things fixed, relentless optimism in the face of adversity, problem solving and ingenuity… I could go on but you’ll notice they’re all things we could win - who wants just to be first?! We really do seem to be making steady progress now and the Caribbean is well and truly in sight. As much as we’re looking forward to all the celebrations of arriving in port I think we’re all going to miss the peaceful solitude and the break from mobile phones and internet access. It feels like we’re in a surreal time warp, it’s been great, and I can hardly believe we’ll get caught up in Christmas festivities before we know where we are - all light years away from here. The biggest disappointment has been. read more...

Skyelark 2 - Friday, December 3

Friday, December 3Going back to the subject of watch rota 24/7 3 on 6 off - it sounds daunting and does sap your energy levels. The saving grace is that every 4/5 days two crew get to do domestic duties (used to be called being “mother” but not allowed to use that term now!).So instead of doing watch we get to clean and make food for the team. Which in itself is no mean featwhen the yacht is rolling side to side at over 30 degrees and implements and pots are flying across the galley. So what is the saving grace? Well you get to have a full night of sleep without having to do watch. A real life saver.The food we make for dinners is based on a preset series of really good and varied menus from all over the world. From tagine, jumbalaya, chowmein...... All are being cooked really well in. read more...

Misty Mhor - Mhor Management Friday 3rd Dec

Something familiar about the weather again. Steady 20 knots easterly. Misty is still rolling and pitching at around 7 knots. We are all a bit batted and bruised. Sleep had been an issue particularly for the upper class crew who have cabins. These are located at the bows and stern and are most vulnerable to pitching and then with the excess rolling on top, it is proving difficult to fall asleep. My bunk is the saloon sofa and is located in the centre of the boat so I have to contend mainly with the rolling. There are of course numerous interruption all night with watch changes, tea making etc. However I’m much better off as my magical lea cloth removes most of the roll issues. The trick is to pull it up tight to the cabin roof, just like a sail on a beat, no sag. I leave the sofa back. read more...

Walkabout - Walkabout - Talk of Scurvy may be Premature - Day14 Mindelo to Grenada

N12:10.0 W58:36.0Oooh! We are getting close to Grenada now!!If things stay as they are/forecast, then we should be in Port Louis sometime tomorrow afternoon (Walkabout Time) - so just one more night at sea, and 190NM to run!!The cookery club has been doing a stock take, and figuring out how much food we need to gorge ourselves on before we arrive!!The list of remaining fresh produce is as follows;1 Orange1 Courgette (zucchini)1 Avocado7 Lemons & Limes1 Cabbage1/2 Red Cabbage6 Tomatoes3 Carrots1/2 MangoBag of potatoes We also have 2x500g beef mince.It’s like ‘Ready, Steady, Cook…’. Suggestions please on what we can rustle up for our final night at sea with that little lot!One thing is for sure, the scary has been held at bay by Traci’s fab victualling.We ate like kings yesterday.For lunch. read more...

Minga - Día 12, Picó picó (Minga)

Con vientos cada vez más suaves, olas más bajas y el debut del pulpo color rojo, Fernando puso toda la fe para pescar nuestro segundo dorado. Para ser justos, todos le dudamos poner la caña (porque aún sigue medio revuelto),pero como dice el Lucho Jara, nos venía bien un golpe de suerte.Una hora más tarde, escuchamos el gratificante sonido del freno en el carrete. Un colorido y gordo mahi mahi de unos 6 kilos venía enganchado en el anzuelo. Tira, tira y bienvenido a la Minga. Que festín se nos viene para el almuerzo!Sumando buenas nuevas, estamos más descansados y recuperados. Anoche pudimos dormir más de 4 horas de corrido entre guardia guarida y porfin retomamos la maratón de GOT.Como dijo la Jose ayer, ningún mar en calma forja buenos marineros. Como ha dicho el Capitán, este cruce es. read more...

Chula - Chula Log 06 - Only use what you need

Over the last winter during our long hours of our refit I had spent many an hour listening to podcasts from Fully Charged. I suppose having a plug-in hybrid car was the stimulus but we have also always had the interest in doing what we can with Chula to be as green as we can. The podcast show talks about everything from electric cars to solar charging, generation and green systems.On the way down to Las Palmas I met a really interesting couple off a boat from who said to me the three most important things on a green boat were "1: only use what you need", "2: only use what you need" and I'm sure you can guess what the third item was.Peter was the first to sail around the globe fossil free on a modest purpose built boat with a number of simple solutions to keep as green as possible. Have a. read more...

Tamanaco - Helming - Valery’s the best

In the past few days we have gradually taken over the autopilot to helm ourselves.It’s a case of man vs. machine.My preconceived idea was that auto pilots are so sophisticated that humans can barely match their performance.And it is true that seeing the autopilot move the wheel at high speed and maintaining its heading target consistently when wind increases is a confidence building thought.THAT said, after a couple disastrous nights when the boat was moving violently due to the brash autopilot corrections (thin sleeping inside a washing machine!) Valery came up with the concept that we ought to do a better job manually, and preserve each other’s sleep. So during the day we each helmed a lot, to gain familiarity with the pattern of boat motions on waves, and degree of correction. read more...

Tilda - In the middle of the ocean

A great sailing day and a lot to celebrate:first of all we gain the record of 203 miles in 24 hours (at an average of 8.4 kn); besides the performance, Fabri, João and Rui took a yoga class to stretch legs, back and arms.Last but not least, we arrived at the emblematic point of “the middle of the ocean”, that signs the exact distance of the 2 sides of this lake called Atlantic.Before leaving we decided this was a passage to celebrate somehow, so we bought a very special jamon iberico in Las Palmas and tonight we had a pork dinner (oink! oink!) with stuffed eggplants with feta cheese and glasses of red wine floating on the table because of a sleepy auto-pilot.After a dramatic pillow fight (sailors never grow old) we have sent message in a bottle of rum. Let’s hope to meet new Tildamigos. read more...

Time Out - Day 12 - Champagne!

Après une nuit très orageuse (vents à près de 40 noeuds et pluie drue), nous nous réveillons de nouveau au soleil. Bis repetita… Nous décidons que nous avons atteint la moitié du chemin (cf hier), et en conséquence, que nous venons de passer un nouveau fuseau horaire (il y a 4 heures de décalage entre les Canaries et Sainte Lucie, nous avons déjà décalé nos montres d’une heure lorsque nous étions au niveau du Cap Vert). Nous mettons nos montres à la nouvelle heure, et profitons de l’heure gagnée pour vaquer à nos activités. Nous n’avons en effet pas pu trouver sur le bateau, dans nos téléphones ou ordinateurs, tous déconnectés, une seule mappemonde représentant les fuseaux horaires! Mais la mesure de l’heure n’étant après tout qu’une convention permettant au monde de fonctionner, nous. read more...

Cajuna - J+13 : des sargasses encore et encore

Des kilomètres de cette algue poison qui dérive, non seulement ça interpelle mais elle nous empêche de pêcher, et c’est pas une excuse !Ceci étant, nous avançons bien, allure de sénateur certes, mais on fait ce que l’on peut avec ce que l’on a. En effet, avec 20kts de vent, un grand SPI reste dans la soute, et le reste est plutôt mouchoir de poche…mais on se rapproche du graal. Tout va bien à bord.En pj un arc en ciel sous le grain.A+image1. read more...

Maalu IV - Day 12 Random Jottings

I can't believe that we are now into our 12th day atsea. We are less than 1250 miles from our destination and possibly looking atarriving in St Lucia towards the end of next week. That will not be a day toosoon as the persistent strong winds and high seas are tiring although we aremaking excellent progress towards St Lucia. We gybed today, a process which tookthree of us over an hour to perform, and are now pointing directly at our nextport.One casualty of the high seas has been our celebrationfor reaching our half way point which we did a little over 24 hours ago. Theplanned celebratory dinner with champagne has been delayed as cookingin these seas is extremely difficult and the idea of adding alcohol into the mixwas deemed totally foolhardy! Currently I am using the frozen. read more...

Emily Morgan - Day 11 - Squalls

Noon position: 19 degrees 33 minutes North; 38 degrees 24 minutes West.We woke to a grey day and a weather forecast that predicted more of the same wind strength and direction for the next few days. Lumpy seas and squalls are to be our sailing conditions for the foreseeable future. When a squall hits, the wind rises and the rain batters down. Fortunately, Emily Morgan has a cockpit canopy so when the squall is imminent we roll down the clear see-through sides which protects us from the elements and then the fun begins. Those on watch wrestle with the helm trying to keep the boat on course. The wind howls through the rigging and sails thump with the pressure of the wind. The noise of the wake against the hull increases as the boat speeds even faster through the water and keels over then. read more...

Sunrise - ARC2021 - Day # 12 on the SUNRISE

Just to notifiy: Yesterday, 1st of December 2021 at 22:32 UTC we officially passed the halfway mark to Saint Lucia! From now on it is shorter to continue our journey than turning around, a kinda strange feeling. The middle of nowhere. We celebrated this event with a delicious Risotto, made by our captain, and a ice-cold can of beer. It is continiously becoming hotter with the sea temperature of around 27° already!This morning we lost two halyards, the genoa halyard and one of the two spinnaker halyards. Seems like both lines wrapped around our improvised fixture on the very top of the sail and they gave in simultaniously. From now on we are using our very last option to set a foresail, the second spinnaker halyard, and hope that this one will last for the remainder of the trip !Our speed. read more...

Skyelark 2 - Thursday, December 2

Thursday, December 2Things you won’t find here: stock reports, celebrity gossip, sound bytes, turn signals, telephone poles, credit cards, appointments, Covid, weekdays, lawns, shopping carts, car exhaust, light pollution, political folderol, walls, `entertainment,` high expectations, 40 different kinds of milk, yo-yos, umbrellas, lost dogs, weekends, escalators, a sock drawer, neighborhoods, public libraries, the right screwdriver, a pinch of sage, a settled stomach, bathtubs, motionless beds, Ethiopian restaurants, ice cream cones, sycamore trees and tree bark more generally, giraffes, walks in the park, the bright red of a cardinal, the sounds a freight train makes, my two boys, Luke and Leander, Carolyn, my wife. –Blog by O.On the other hand, things you will find here: clothes pegs,. read more...

Minga - Día 11, mitad de travesía

Finalmente vemos el sol, los cielos se abren y empezamos a tomar un respiro, las olas continúan pero la tripulación ya lo hizo parte de su rutina...Terminamos de comer lo que quedaba de mahi mahi, hice un rico sashimi y el resto al horno con mantequilla, ajo,sal y pimienta. Las delicias que nos ofrece está querida mar, y que a uno lo hace sentirse tan pequeño en este mundo que uno cree que conoce. PD: no hemos pescado por la ola.Saludos JuanpiSent from Iridium Mail & Web.. read more...

Morgane of Sark - early update after much nightly activity

An early update today, as there has been quite some activity since yesterday evening.It was a squally night!! They popped up at the radar all the time. Sometimes suddenly seem to develop right next to us. One hit us right on our butt with more than 40 knots of wind and a tremendous amount of water pouring down from the sky. Herco even had to put on his Musto heavy weather sail jacket. While even at night it is still around 27 degrees..But, we were prepared and with only a reefed main we experienced no problems. The good thing about the squals is that the disappear as quick as they arrive. It lasted around 10 or 15 minutes. The rest of the night was genua in, genua (half) out, as the squals flew by. Fortunately, we weren’t hit that hard anymore, just a few tails passed by with a few. read more...

Misty Mhor - Misty Mourning Thursday 2nd Dec

I’ll get to the Mahi and carrots later. We managed the time warp issues ok. Lunch was served a bit later as we had moved our watches back, so it was devoured rapidly. Reviewing the night time duty rota it was decided to keep to the established order but to add a first watch from 20.00 to 22.00. This means that the first watch also does 04 to 06, but that isn’t such great imposition. We were expecting the wind to back a little and maybe get lighter. But it didn’t so we gybed to ensure the shortest course to St Lucia. We were chatting to another ARC boat, Mary Doll on the single side band radio. They report 40 knot winds and are further south than us, so maybe we will stay north. Mary Doll also reported to us that they have a none functioning Iridium transmitter. If you are expecting. read more...

Calash - Day 11 – Wednesday 1 December 2021

 Thankfully next watch for Colin & Callum was more consistent winds; more conducive to a better sleep.  The waves were still rolling in, but by now ‘Antoine’ the AI Autopilot had full competence to smooth out the big boys, with a delicate power drift off the top and anti-cork-screw manoeuvre.  This hasn’t always been successful, however, with everyone picking up a few injuries here and there.  Damage report includes me slamming my back into a door handle (at the exact point of previous back pain), Callum headbutting the fridge door and Alan throwing hot tea all down his belly. Still, we are all surviving, getting used to the conditions and staying relatively sane and not too grumpy (apart from me of course – on both fronts).At least we managed to catch our first fish; or. read more...

Khamsin - Khamsin Day 14

Just had one of those nights where you feel you didn’t sleep at all. Plucky Khamsin has had to battle hard all through the night: whereas yesterday the sea was on our side and the 3-4 metre swell gave her a swooshing kick, last night it turned more hostile and she was pummelled continuously from dusk til dawn. Having said that, once settled into the routine of squally showers and gusty winds passing through regularly, I quite enjoyed my night watch tho I got pretty wet a few times when waves crashed over the back of the boat, and had to rescue a few flying fish who were surprised to find themselves unexpectedly in our cockpit. I did try to photo their dragonfly wings for Piers but pretty unsuccessfully as it turned out. Right. What happened yesterday. For me yesterday was mixed thanks to. read more...

Walkabout - Walkabout - The Day After the Night Before - Day13 Mindelo to Grenada

NAfter the excitement of the ‘Tiramisu’ rendezvous, the next 24 hours have been looooong…. Some serious lack of sleep for both of us.Just at the time when the weather decides to play all of it's cards.We have had the strongest winds of the crossing (30.2knots was the highest seen), the biggest swells (hard to judge but look like 4m or so), and a steady flow of squalls through the night, bringing wind shift and heavy rain.All of these things are not conducive to catching up on sleep.You need to be paying attention when in the cockpit, as there is a lot of power in sails and if the steering ‘lets go’ in a gust it all gets very messy, very quickly.Once we got going again yesterday after our rendezvous, I did put the hammer down a bit (competitive - moi??!).We saw 10 knots of boats speed. read more...

Morgane of Sark - pup quiz Wednesday

Hi there, going into our 13 th night. Today flew by. Last night a couple of squals came close, but didn’t hit us. So, it was a good night.This afternoon we did a pup quiz on the VHF with the guys from Sandy Cay. They are about 6 miles ahead of us, so we can communicate on the VHF. We had a lot of chips and nachos and they also had popcorn and fresh made hummus. Like a little party.The pup quiz was a lot of fun. Both boats prepared 10 questions and the losers have to pay for the Pina Colada’s in Grenada. The score was 3-4, when a squal came to chase us. Wequickly closed all the windows and rolled in our genua and changed course a bit. Fortunately, the squal just passed by. But than, the squal was moving towards Sandy Cay. It was already going towards “dinner time, and it looked a bit. read more...

Tamanaco - day 11

Transatlantique 11La nuit tous les chats sont gris. Le quart de nuit sur un voilier au milieu de l’océan est un moment particulier. Toutes les sensations sont décuplées. Le mouvement du bateau parait erratique pourtant il n’est pas vraiment différent de celui de la journée, c’est juste que sans la vue on n’anticipe pas les vagues. Nous sommes plus attentifs aux bruits. Un peu comme dans « Skriit skraatch dip clapot » ce merveilleux livre pour enfants. Un voilier fait un peu cela à sa manière. Quand on n’est pas habitué à naviguer tous les bruits nous paraissent étranges voir inquiétant. Quand la voile claque ou qu’une vague vient frapper la coque tout vibre. Quand il y a du roulis c’est tout ce qu’il y a dans les armoires qui cliquette. Cela peut devenir très agaçant quand on. read more...