After 4 days becalmed we are struggling to amuse ourselves...
Very very hot and no shade anywhere but here
Coaxing the asymetric into life
I see no ships
First step North - leaving the Cape VerdesA much better start to this passage! Indeed we've been treated to a perfect sailing day by good man Neptune! We left Tarrafal a little earlier than expected (gas bottle recovered) as a small high pressure system, with its classic candy floss clouds and gentle winds, sped accross from the Caribbean faster than anticipated. We are hitching a lift on its Northeasterlies in its Southeastern corner. For once our heading is pretty spot on North! We had both almost forgotten the pleasure of passages like this: comfortable and on course. With the weather benign, we are able to relax and continue to credit our bank account of sleep.
Dolphins came to play as we rounded Sao Nicolau to the West this morning wherupon we were met by an enormous lolling swell nonchalently heading South, to Cape Town perhaps for supper.
The sea is again the rich indigo that only the atlantic at these latitudes seems to produce. In the afternoons, the dazzling sun casts half a glittering diamond between us and the solid blue horizon. By evening this is no more than a thin stripe of light, slightly pink. It then disappears altogether as the giant peach of a sun slips behind the vast wall of water, leaving a skyfull of small puffy clouds. The new moon comes up, a slim cuticle of brightness, and the sky slowly fills with a clutch of stars.
Impulse is creaming on through the swell at 4-5 knots which is respectable given that the true wind speed is 3-5. The hatches are open to the cool night air. The oven if full of freshly baked bread. The boat is quiet and sleep comes easily. Perfect.
Our plan is to travel North and slightly West on this high pressure system until we meet a band of variable and very light winds. These will precede our transfer into the South Western sector of a low pressure system, centered around the Azores and moving North East. If we miss this first low, we can cadge a ride on a second which is due to follow several days later. That is the theory at least. In practice so far so good.
Another glorious sailing day. I have been reading the classic voyaging stories of small craft which certainly confirms how lucky we are. Firstly: Clare Francis sailing the Northern route form Plymouth to Newport, US. She wasn't exactly able to don her bikini but instead wore paper knickers whilst she dodged icebergs, suffering freezing fog, frequent gales, a storm 10 with 50 foot waves and an endlessly leaky boat (all this in a one month race). Vito Dumas endured much the same (bar the paper knickers which I don't think anyone had invented then, the 1940's) but at the globe's other extreme. Sailing the 'Roaring Forties' solo he had to contend with gales 80% of the time, frequent bouts of bailing and a sceptic abscess in his arm which, in the end, he was forced to dig out with the end of a marlin spike. Me thinks we have it easy.
We are just beginning to make a small dent in the large quantity of rusty tins of sardines (31 in total) I acquired in the Gambia fearing I may never be able to victual again. I got some stick at the time for this mammouth purchase so I was very pleased to read that Sir Robin Knox Jonson's stores included 24 tins of the slimy critters. "See!" I declared reproachfully "we don't have that many". Casper rightfully pointed out that Sir Robin, with slightly fewer of the fishy items than us, sailed round the entire globe and did it non-stop to boot. Point taken.
I have been dreaming up menus for a half way point celebration meal (sardines anyone?) but the problem is that we don't know where that is as we still haven't decided whether we are going to the Canaries, Madeira or the Azores direct. It all depends how quickly the forecast fronts pass as well as their strength. Every morning we listen to Radio France Inter and cross reference their predictions with the Passage Weather forecast we downloaded in port and which runs for another 6 days. On the basis of these two sources of information we can paint a rough picture of what to expect as we progress North.
Progressing North is rather slow at present. Very little wind but the sea is delightfully flat. We are just managing to keep 2-3 knots of boat speed and therefore avoiding the dreaded flip-flop of an empty mainsail. The night was quiet, we haven't seen anything else since we left Cabo Verde. I decided to leave the helm to Gloria and trust that Impulse would wake me if the anything needed doing - which she did frequently with a flapping sheet here and an unhappy headsail there. We both seem to need a lot of sleep right now and therefore any chance we get is grasped. These calm conditions are ideal for a bit of R&R.
Lots of people have asked us how we organise our watch system. Its simple: whoever is most tired sleeps first. Unless the weather requires us both on deck, after supper we decide which one of us needs to visit the land of nod first. The watch keeper stays on until the early hours, taking a 15 minute nap here and there if his/her head feels too heavy for neck. We use a highly advanced system to ensure that we are not struck by a ship: an eggtimer the shape of a pepper and set to 15 minutes. Why 15? Because, at the maximum speed a ship travels, it would take it 20 minutes to hit us from a position on the horizon. Between 1 and 3 in the morning, depending on how tired each one of us is, we swap over until daybreak. Of course this 'system' changes when the weather is bad when we tend to do shorter watches as they are more demanding both physically and mentally. When its rough we don't sleep in the cabin - down in the hulls it's noisy, you get wet coming on deck and, most importantly, you are just a little too far away if a second pair of hands is required speedily.
Early this morning the wind swung round to SSE and decreased to 2-3 knots. Sailing into it with the screecher close hauled maintained a respectable speed but sent us too far East if we are to catch the Southwesterlies in the area NW of here. The logical sail to don was the asymetric reacher, a lightweight spinnaker which is flexible enough to take the wind from the beam and the stern quarter. It was uncooperative and flew reluctantly before giving up and clinging to the rigging. Not suprising really, there just was too little wind. After a swim and another look at the weather forecast we resolve to motor on NW.
Just now at local noon (16 minutes before the Archers to you and me) the sky looks decidedly different. From my patch of shade immediately under the boom I stretch out an arm. A thumb's width from the horizon lies a heavy band of cumulus cloud. This appears to be moving West. Below it a procession of moustachio shaped cirrus whisks and curls in precisely the opposite direction. It looks like we're on the brink of entering a new weather zone.
On another note I have discovered that although Vito Dumas did not wear paper knickers whilst sailing the 'Roaring Forties' he did wear 'a sack lined with bits of newspaper' (p79). Rock on M&S. And, did you know - creationists look away now - that dolphins evolved from four legged creatures that looked like wolves and are more closely related to hippos than fish? Well I didn't and I'm amazed. Who needs Radio 4 anyway? Oooh, engine's off, must be time to hoist that main again.
Out on deck I find a scowling skipper. The wind has picked up and is coming from dead aft making the ideal sail precisely the one Casper neatly stowed away 15 minutes ago. Anyhow, now it's filling happily. But....
Not for long - back under engine . Feel so much better for a solar shower on deck just before the sun lost its heat. The sky ahead looks grey and menacing (and on the bright side full of wind). Tonight being possibly the last quiet one for a bit we decided to throw a party. Only clean people admitted, wine served and canapes too. Music blasting, we motor on. Chess and perchance a filum later. It feels a bit like last rights - final fling before the weather turns sour.
Indeed as the saying goes - the party's over. In the early hours the wind picked up sufficiently for Casper to set the Screecher and main to gently beat Northwards. I awoke at 4, aware that the sails were no longer happy. The wind had veered South. I set the sails to take the wind at 7 o'clock which gave us a Northwesterly heading. Within 20 minutes the mild night breeze had whipped itself into a shirty 5-6 and we were soon treble reefed. How amazing it feels though to be progressing North with following winds and seas!
Most of today was a little uncomfortable and Casper confessed to feeling a little iffy. This evening though the wind backed NW and halved in strength. We are close hauled again in a force 3. Still the sea follows. Although somewhat uncharacteristically not touched by the dreaded mal de mer, I have been finding it hard to sleep with the boat so noisy again.
My night watch was trying and comical (if only I could have seen it at the time). At about 9, after curry and couscous, Casper went down to sleep in the hull, leaving me with a cup of tea and chapter one of a talking book by Jane Mansfield. I must have nodded off because suddenly Miss Mansfield was on chapter three and I had tea all over my lap. Growling, I mopped up the mess and decided that the boat was feeling sluggish as the wind had decreased. I contemplated putting the Screecher up, waiting a goodly half hour just to make sure the wind wasn't just pretending. After the alotted 30 minutes and no change to the wind I set about hoisting the headsail. Naturally everything takes longer and requires more effort when you are single handing and it took me a good 15 minutes to get the thing set correctly. The boat speed increased by a knot or two - all was well. I was aware that the batteries were a little low as the solar panels hadn't had as much sunshine as they like and Gloria was hungry for power in order to steer downwind accurately on this lumpy sea. A good case for unleashing the water generator I thought. The generator's prop hangs at the end of a stainless leg about a metre long. To get it to run all you have to do is lower the leg until the blades are set in motion by the force of the water. Simple. Well I huffed and puffed over this damn thing for a good 20 minutes. I could get the leg down but it then swivelled slightly so that the blades were no longer square onto the direction of the water. I tried and tried to adjust the little rotter but couldn't. Nothing more to do than take it back up. Just then the wind increased markedly and the pressure of the water against the generator was so great that I couldn't lift the damn thing out anymore. The Screecher was making the unhappy sounds of a sail requiring dousing but I couldn't assist as I was pinned to the water generator, unwilling to let it go for fear that I'd never get it back up again. With my legs akimbo, one hand clasping the leg of the generator and the other outstretched like something out of Inspector Gadget I just managed to reach Gloria's buttons and bore away considerably to slow the boat down. This did the trick and I succeded in tying the generator back up declaring that this was most definately a job pertaining to the blue domain and I would not be doing it again. Now - the Screecher. Of course it refused to furl at first and flapped and flapped in the night air. I didn't fancy my chances of dropping it unfurled without it ending up in the drink. The sheets had disappeared over the side and thus were counteracting my furling action. I pulled them out of the water (at least they weren't stuck round anything) and eventually got the sail down and lashed to the trampoline. Throughout all of this I was wearing a headtorch the front of which kept inexplicably flopping down on the bridge of my nose and blinding me. I got a shoeful of wee when I relieved my self over the davits so as not to wake Casper and managed to whack my head on the entrance to the pod twice as I went to check the apparent wind speed.
Last night's watch was not much better with the wind decreased and the sails lollopping this way and that and Impulse unable to make much Northing. I was incredibly tired which didn't help. Daytime however had given us wonderful sailing weather with a steady breeze from WNW, a gentle sea and a beautiful sunny sky. We spoke to another cat and a tanker on the VHF - our first bit of company (bar two birds) in 5 days. We took full advantage of the comfortable sailing conditions and indulged ourselves: a talking book by Wilber Smith, a freshly baked pizza followed by sponge cake, custard and a game of chess (not such a happy event for me as I lost in 10 moves).
Today, our sixth day of this 1400 mile passage and we are well and truly becalmed. We ran the port engine dry and now are under starboard heading Northwest into that elusive band of wind the forcasters have, annoyingly, been banging on about. The predictions for the last 24 hours have, to date, not materialised. We are making the best of it though, reading, planning fresh adventures and relaxing on the trampoline. We were joined, briefly, by four curious Atlantic Spotted dolphins, beautifully marked as always. Now, an hour before sunset, spokes of light hang from an ominous cloud above a motionless sea. Ominous and perhaps filled with wind?
Dolphins came to play as we rounded Sao Nicolau to the West this morning wherupon we were met by an enormous lolling swell nonchalently heading South, to Cape Town perhaps for supper.
The sea is again the rich indigo that only the atlantic at these latitudes seems to produce. In the afternoons, the dazzling sun casts half a glittering diamond between us and the solid blue horizon. By evening this is no more than a thin stripe of light, slightly pink. It then disappears altogether as the giant peach of a sun slips behind the vast wall of water, leaving a skyfull of small puffy clouds. The new moon comes up, a slim cuticle of brightness, and the sky slowly fills with a clutch of stars.
Impulse is creaming on through the swell at 4-5 knots which is respectable given that the true wind speed is 3-5. The hatches are open to the cool night air. The oven if full of freshly baked bread. The boat is quiet and sleep comes easily. Perfect.
Our plan is to travel North and slightly West on this high pressure system until we meet a band of variable and very light winds. These will precede our transfer into the South Western sector of a low pressure system, centered around the Azores and moving North East. If we miss this first low, we can cadge a ride on a second which is due to follow several days later. That is the theory at least. In practice so far so good.
Another glorious sailing day. I have been reading the classic voyaging stories of small craft which certainly confirms how lucky we are. Firstly: Clare Francis sailing the Northern route form Plymouth to Newport, US. She wasn't exactly able to don her bikini but instead wore paper knickers whilst she dodged icebergs, suffering freezing fog, frequent gales, a storm 10 with 50 foot waves and an endlessly leaky boat (all this in a one month race). Vito Dumas endured much the same (bar the paper knickers which I don't think anyone had invented then, the 1940's) but at the globe's other extreme. Sailing the 'Roaring Forties' solo he had to contend with gales 80% of the time, frequent bouts of bailing and a sceptic abscess in his arm which, in the end, he was forced to dig out with the end of a marlin spike. Me thinks we have it easy.
We are just beginning to make a small dent in the large quantity of rusty tins of sardines (31 in total) I acquired in the Gambia fearing I may never be able to victual again. I got some stick at the time for this mammouth purchase so I was very pleased to read that Sir Robin Knox Jonson's stores included 24 tins of the slimy critters. "See!" I declared reproachfully "we don't have that many". Casper rightfully pointed out that Sir Robin, with slightly fewer of the fishy items than us, sailed round the entire globe and did it non-stop to boot. Point taken.
I have been dreaming up menus for a half way point celebration meal (sardines anyone?) but the problem is that we don't know where that is as we still haven't decided whether we are going to the Canaries, Madeira or the Azores direct. It all depends how quickly the forecast fronts pass as well as their strength. Every morning we listen to Radio France Inter and cross reference their predictions with the Passage Weather forecast we downloaded in port and which runs for another 6 days. On the basis of these two sources of information we can paint a rough picture of what to expect as we progress North.
Progressing North is rather slow at present. Very little wind but the sea is delightfully flat. We are just managing to keep 2-3 knots of boat speed and therefore avoiding the dreaded flip-flop of an empty mainsail. The night was quiet, we haven't seen anything else since we left Cabo Verde. I decided to leave the helm to Gloria and trust that Impulse would wake me if the anything needed doing - which she did frequently with a flapping sheet here and an unhappy headsail there. We both seem to need a lot of sleep right now and therefore any chance we get is grasped. These calm conditions are ideal for a bit of R&R.
Lots of people have asked us how we organise our watch system. Its simple: whoever is most tired sleeps first. Unless the weather requires us both on deck, after supper we decide which one of us needs to visit the land of nod first. The watch keeper stays on until the early hours, taking a 15 minute nap here and there if his/her head feels too heavy for neck. We use a highly advanced system to ensure that we are not struck by a ship: an eggtimer the shape of a pepper and set to 15 minutes. Why 15? Because, at the maximum speed a ship travels, it would take it 20 minutes to hit us from a position on the horizon. Between 1 and 3 in the morning, depending on how tired each one of us is, we swap over until daybreak. Of course this 'system' changes when the weather is bad when we tend to do shorter watches as they are more demanding both physically and mentally. When its rough we don't sleep in the cabin - down in the hulls it's noisy, you get wet coming on deck and, most importantly, you are just a little too far away if a second pair of hands is required speedily.
Early this morning the wind swung round to SSE and decreased to 2-3 knots. Sailing into it with the screecher close hauled maintained a respectable speed but sent us too far East if we are to catch the Southwesterlies in the area NW of here. The logical sail to don was the asymetric reacher, a lightweight spinnaker which is flexible enough to take the wind from the beam and the stern quarter. It was uncooperative and flew reluctantly before giving up and clinging to the rigging. Not suprising really, there just was too little wind. After a swim and another look at the weather forecast we resolve to motor on NW.
Just now at local noon (16 minutes before the Archers to you and me) the sky looks decidedly different. From my patch of shade immediately under the boom I stretch out an arm. A thumb's width from the horizon lies a heavy band of cumulus cloud. This appears to be moving West. Below it a procession of moustachio shaped cirrus whisks and curls in precisely the opposite direction. It looks like we're on the brink of entering a new weather zone.
On another note I have discovered that although Vito Dumas did not wear paper knickers whilst sailing the 'Roaring Forties' he did wear 'a sack lined with bits of newspaper' (p79). Rock on M&S. And, did you know - creationists look away now - that dolphins evolved from four legged creatures that looked like wolves and are more closely related to hippos than fish? Well I didn't and I'm amazed. Who needs Radio 4 anyway? Oooh, engine's off, must be time to hoist that main again.
Out on deck I find a scowling skipper. The wind has picked up and is coming from dead aft making the ideal sail precisely the one Casper neatly stowed away 15 minutes ago. Anyhow, now it's filling happily. But....
Not for long - back under engine . Feel so much better for a solar shower on deck just before the sun lost its heat. The sky ahead looks grey and menacing (and on the bright side full of wind). Tonight being possibly the last quiet one for a bit we decided to throw a party. Only clean people admitted, wine served and canapes too. Music blasting, we motor on. Chess and perchance a filum later. It feels a bit like last rights - final fling before the weather turns sour.
Indeed as the saying goes - the party's over. In the early hours the wind picked up sufficiently for Casper to set the Screecher and main to gently beat Northwards. I awoke at 4, aware that the sails were no longer happy. The wind had veered South. I set the sails to take the wind at 7 o'clock which gave us a Northwesterly heading. Within 20 minutes the mild night breeze had whipped itself into a shirty 5-6 and we were soon treble reefed. How amazing it feels though to be progressing North with following winds and seas!
Most of today was a little uncomfortable and Casper confessed to feeling a little iffy. This evening though the wind backed NW and halved in strength. We are close hauled again in a force 3. Still the sea follows. Although somewhat uncharacteristically not touched by the dreaded mal de mer, I have been finding it hard to sleep with the boat so noisy again.
My night watch was trying and comical (if only I could have seen it at the time). At about 9, after curry and couscous, Casper went down to sleep in the hull, leaving me with a cup of tea and chapter one of a talking book by Jane Mansfield. I must have nodded off because suddenly Miss Mansfield was on chapter three and I had tea all over my lap. Growling, I mopped up the mess and decided that the boat was feeling sluggish as the wind had decreased. I contemplated putting the Screecher up, waiting a goodly half hour just to make sure the wind wasn't just pretending. After the alotted 30 minutes and no change to the wind I set about hoisting the headsail. Naturally everything takes longer and requires more effort when you are single handing and it took me a good 15 minutes to get the thing set correctly. The boat speed increased by a knot or two - all was well. I was aware that the batteries were a little low as the solar panels hadn't had as much sunshine as they like and Gloria was hungry for power in order to steer downwind accurately on this lumpy sea. A good case for unleashing the water generator I thought. The generator's prop hangs at the end of a stainless leg about a metre long. To get it to run all you have to do is lower the leg until the blades are set in motion by the force of the water. Simple. Well I huffed and puffed over this damn thing for a good 20 minutes. I could get the leg down but it then swivelled slightly so that the blades were no longer square onto the direction of the water. I tried and tried to adjust the little rotter but couldn't. Nothing more to do than take it back up. Just then the wind increased markedly and the pressure of the water against the generator was so great that I couldn't lift the damn thing out anymore. The Screecher was making the unhappy sounds of a sail requiring dousing but I couldn't assist as I was pinned to the water generator, unwilling to let it go for fear that I'd never get it back up again. With my legs akimbo, one hand clasping the leg of the generator and the other outstretched like something out of Inspector Gadget I just managed to reach Gloria's buttons and bore away considerably to slow the boat down. This did the trick and I succeded in tying the generator back up declaring that this was most definately a job pertaining to the blue domain and I would not be doing it again. Now - the Screecher. Of course it refused to furl at first and flapped and flapped in the night air. I didn't fancy my chances of dropping it unfurled without it ending up in the drink. The sheets had disappeared over the side and thus were counteracting my furling action. I pulled them out of the water (at least they weren't stuck round anything) and eventually got the sail down and lashed to the trampoline. Throughout all of this I was wearing a headtorch the front of which kept inexplicably flopping down on the bridge of my nose and blinding me. I got a shoeful of wee when I relieved my self over the davits so as not to wake Casper and managed to whack my head on the entrance to the pod twice as I went to check the apparent wind speed.
Last night's watch was not much better with the wind decreased and the sails lollopping this way and that and Impulse unable to make much Northing. I was incredibly tired which didn't help. Daytime however had given us wonderful sailing weather with a steady breeze from WNW, a gentle sea and a beautiful sunny sky. We spoke to another cat and a tanker on the VHF - our first bit of company (bar two birds) in 5 days. We took full advantage of the comfortable sailing conditions and indulged ourselves: a talking book by Wilber Smith, a freshly baked pizza followed by sponge cake, custard and a game of chess (not such a happy event for me as I lost in 10 moves).
Today, our sixth day of this 1400 mile passage and we are well and truly becalmed. We ran the port engine dry and now are under starboard heading Northwest into that elusive band of wind the forcasters have, annoyingly, been banging on about. The predictions for the last 24 hours have, to date, not materialised. We are making the best of it though, reading, planning fresh adventures and relaxing on the trampoline. We were joined, briefly, by four curious Atlantic Spotted dolphins, beautifully marked as always. Now, an hour before sunset, spokes of light hang from an ominous cloud above a motionless sea. Ominous and perhaps filled with wind?
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