Monday 18 August 2014
Day 9 dawned with grey skies, the threat of lots of breeze and some decent swell to go with it. It’s rather like that hard run or cycle you’ve done – you’re pretty exhausted and want the end but up ahead is a hill. Our hill arrived with 14-15 knots of wind with constant gusts…
Sunday 17 August 2014
Day 8, dawn rose and we knew we were approaching the infamous South Pacific Convergence Zone – the so-called Beast! In technical terms easterly winds from the tropics collide with more southerly winds bought on from down south. At times all is calm but at times there is a right old argument between the two…
Friday 15 August 2014
Day 7 and come dawn the seas had settled and we were sailing upwind ticking along at 4-5 knots. Nothing special but considering we were meant to be in light winds and motoring it was a rather pleasant surprise. Having mentioned our three worst points of sail it seems only fair to mention our three…
Friday 15 August 2014
Day 6 and come sunrise we agreed we’d hoist the spinnaker pole and try goose-winging. That notorious sailing method of pinning your main sail to one side and poling out the genoa to the other side. So Tom had to wake Susie barely an hour asleep with a “Sorry to disturb you but…” It’s hard…
Wednesday 13 August 2014
Day 5 Tuesday dawned and we had wind but we also had 2m confused seas on the beam. If we had to list the three ways of sailing we don’t particularly enjoy it would be: 1. Upwind in open seas with waves 2. Goose-winging dead downwind(sail on each side of the boat) causing the boat…
Tuesday 12 August 2014
Day 4 the winds didn’t last that long and we yet again had to do our procedure of dropping the parasailor and bringing in the water generator and getting the engine on. Mornings are quieter now as more sleep is taken to compensate for sleep lost. Onboard we have a long range radio (technically called…
Monday 11 August 2014
Saturday’s log showed we had sailed 90 nautical miles. An average day is 120 nautical miles so that goes down as a slow day! But who’s complaining when the sun is rising and a full moon is setting in synchronisation and giving the most lovely of three hundred and sixty degree skies of salmon pink,…