Oldies On Tour

Position @ 1200 UTC

35⁰ 24.53 N 42⁰ 52.13 W

Nautical Miles traveled in last 24 hrs:- 137

The night quitened down, still 25 gusting to 35 knots of wind so went through with only Staysail and a very reefed main, kept the Radar on all night but nothing happened to us I am pleased to say. Not so for another competetor, “Setanti”,apparently they hit something below the water line around 0300 hrs this morning and which broke their rudder and sent it up into their transom. They put out a “May Day” and contacted ARC Control and of course Falmouth who coordianted the rescue. She obviously lost all her steering and was bobbing about in the north atlantic. We were 300 miles plus away from her so we were of no use but “Gilly of London” started to go to her rescue. The up shot of it all this was that there was the freighter in the area. It went and picked up the 4 aboard but unfortunatly the boat had to be abandoned, In fact they couldn’t just leave her as a hazzard, no doubt they scuttled her. What a shame, still no one hurt, thats the main thing. No one knows what they hit below the water but I suspect it would have been a container that had fallen of some cargo ship! That is the one fear I have, especially travelling at night. You have little chance of spotting them during the day but zero chance at night.

As things were quiter this morning we took the opportunity to have a look at the broken bit on the end of the Jib pole, the good news is that nothing was broken, the up haul had a quick release shackle and it had got twisted by the out haul in the wind which caught the lever that released the jib sheet. Tieing a bowling around the end of the out haul and attaching the down haul’s quick release shackle cured the problem. We are now back poling out the jib and up to 7 knots. Our “Red Ensign” and our cockpit “hood” have both suffered over the last coupleof days, so replacements will be needed in those departments!

This mornings forecast isn’t much better, we are still being chased by the “lows” but are hoping they die out before we have to finally cut north. We have co nsidered leaving out the Azores and carrying straight on to Lagos but we can’t. Manly because this may be the last opportunity I get to go to the Azores, after all it’s not on any hoiday routes!!! and secondly we have a change in crew, Andrew leaves us and Vince joins us

We also filled the Generator tanl and the three1 gallon containers with diesel which we now use as it is easier to fill the generator from the1 gall container than the 5 gallon containers.

Home made bread, tosted was for breakfast and we have now finished the first loaf. Looks as if I will have to bake again tomorrow! Coffee and a biscut for lunch and into BBC, the film being “The Spy Who Loved Me” Half way through we had to take in the Jib and set the staysail and reef in some of the main as the wind was getting back up again. Naturally as soon as we had done that it dropped! Anywaywe wereset for the night and a little over 600 miles to run along the rhum line.

Tonight for the second time we are going to try and finish the lasagne, but we did have some of the fish soup to finish. Unfortunatly for some perculiar reason the oven wouldn’t stay alight so we finished having the fish soup at about 1830 hrs an Lasagne about 2000hrs: so for the fist time we didn’t all sit down together to enjoy a meal. Chris was in the cockpit, I was a the chart table and Andrew was fiddling with something. Anyway dinner over, we were already battened downfor the night and I did the 2100 hrs to midnight.

Apart from very high seas, wind around 28 to 34 knots and gusting around 36 knots a pleasent, but cold and verynwet night!! Oh yes I did reef in the Staysail a bit before handing over to Andrew!

Position @ 1200 UTC

35⁰ 05.42 N 45⁰ 25.86 W

Nautical Miles traveled in last 24 hrs:- 152

A bit of a hectic night, the pin at the end of the pole keeping the jib sheet came detached/broke so the sheet jumped out so had to haul the jib in and put out the staysail. The main was also pulled out but with the equivelent of 3 reefs in. Naturally our speed fel from 6 ish to 4 nish knots but at that time noon new what to expect weather wise.

I came up at 0600 hrs as usual and left the rig as it was even though the speed was well down. A good decision as with the passing of the day the seas became more confused and the wind grew stronger so our rig was exactly what was called for; in fact we didn’t change it once during the day and went into night with it.

The issue is simple. We have a stationary very high pressure to East of us, which is South West of the Azores and we have a number of low pressure fronts from the North West of us and coming our way. We are trying to navigate ourselves in the middle but erring on the High Pressure front side. The “Gun Ho” boats are keeping nearer to the low pressure, goodluck to them. The highest wind speed we recorded during the day wa 38 knots, Anam Cara didn’t “bat an eye lid” just took it in her stride. As I have said before Anam Cara can take much more than we mere mortals can take!For exapmle, today we were hit side on by a rouge wave, several tons of water smack into her mid drif with the brunt of it being taken by the small window above the fridge: How the window glass didn’t break I don’t know but all 4 of us were in the saloon at the time and we all ducked expecting water to flow in, but it didn’t, good old girl.

Early afternoon we watched “Mutuny on the Bounty” and I made two loaves of bread, not the most sensible thing to do in this sort of weather but we are out of bread now!

Apart from the high seas and the wind we are now having specially when the rouge wave comes in and slams water right over the boat! Visibility is also poor so we have beenrunning our radarall day and no doubt will dosomright through the night.. Wonderfull thing radar but the down side is the amount of power it consumes. We ran the generator untill the batteries were fully charged and no doubt we will have to do a boost during the night as well.

Paddy cooked a superb fish soup/stew and to follow we were going to have the rest of the Lasagne.The bread came out of the oven at the same time and I have to say both loaves were a succss; in fact we only had the fish soup and bread, the lasagne didn’t get eaten.

Battening down everything followed dinner, ready for a night to remember or will it????

Position @ 1200 UTC

35⁰ 07.43 N 48⁰ 16.07 W

Nautical Miles traveled in last 24 hrs:- 143

Another quiet night though we did reef in the poled out Jib a little at 0300hrs as it looked as if the wind may just strengthen, but it didn’t, so when I came on at 0600hrs the first thing I did was let the jib right out again. Anam Cara can take 25 knot winds from the stern when poled out quite comfortably

Morning uneventfull other than pouring over the various weather reports we have received, one has to wonder how much “Hype” there is going on over the prospect of poor weather. A late breakfast of omletes became lunch and at midday today the ship’s clocks changed one hour forward.

Not having had to run the main engine for the past 24 hrs plus, we had to put the geneator on, hence the eggs for breakfast. I am pleased to say (with fingers crossed) it starts well, does its job of chargiing the batteries and provides power for th mains kettle, toaster etc as it should, good girl!

A lazy afternooncatching up with slep and running stillwith poled out Jib and staysail though the wind did veer so had to takein the staysail during this period. This was he first time we furled it in since we greased the roller bearing at the top of the foil, so it was fingers crossed it worked OK, I amk pleased to say it went inj as if new, thank goodness!

The afternoon film today was back to Boind in “The Man With The Golden Gun”;only “QB” today not “BBC” Pady wascooking Salmon burgers.

At 1830 hrs, we opened our bottle of Chilean Champers to celabrate and toast Anam Cara as we crossed the mid point, we are now nearer to the Azores than Bermuda, always a nice momentg in time, the half way mark.

The weather for tonight could be anybodies guess so have reefed the Jib, though kept it poled out and see what happens.

When I finished my watch at Midnight, we had had an un-eventfull night, see what happens during the rest of the night!

Position @ 1200 UTC

35⁰ 16.73 N 51⁰ 05.03 W

Nautical Miles traveled in last 24 hrs:- 140

Very quiet night and still motor sailing and heading east, south east. The only problem was that during the night Chris tried to bring in the Staysail and it jammed so not being that important he left it. When I came up with Paddy it was daylght and as the sea was calm went up to the bow to see what had happened. The ball bearing race that attached the top of the staysail to the furlinhg foil had become tangled and twisted around the foil. This happened back in February whilst in Antigua. I had a rigger look at it and though there were several ball bearings missing he said he had seen worse and that it only wantd lubricating. This we did and it has been fine, until now! When Andrew was up he and I dropped the staysail on the deck and gave the ball bearing race a good grease and sent it back up the foil. It worked again and we were able to furl the staysail away again. Unfortunatly there are now more ball bearings missing so must get a new one as soon as possible.

After listening to the net again and seing the weather forecast we dcided to turn due East, we think we have gone as far South as we need to to avoid the worst of the weather, time will tell if we made the right call or not! Anyway by heading around 090 degrees, we had what wind there was available right up our backside, so we rigged for down wind sailing. Out came the big pole and we poled out the Jib and out came the whisker pole and we poled out the staysail and there we were travelling between 5 and 6 knots, no engine; great!

During lunch we had a chat about watches and duties etc., and we all agreed that Paddy (Grainne) was not ready yet to manage a night watch on her own and would not be able to change sail settings if needed so the thre of us will continue with the 3 man watch system we have and is working very well: Paddy would undertake mother watch and do the cooking. I explained that the whole point of having 4 on board was to share the watches etc but if she undertook the cookinmg duties that would also be a great help. There is no reason why she can’t help with other watches and learn if she feels so disposed, I hope she does.

I made a Lasagne tonight and that saw off the last of our fresh meat and chocolate brownies were also made as the oven was already on. We are still on bread we bought in Bermuda but this is coming to an end so willhave to bake bread in the next day or so!!!

Afternoon matanee was differewnt, no BBC today, it was the film “Notting Hill”,a change so no beer and no crisps!

Looking at the weather and seting night sails, we decided to continue with the poled out jib and stay sail, it was working welkl and the winds were just about right,soseetomorrow what happened, hopefully nothing!!

Position @1200 UTC

35⁰ 31.08 N 53⁰ 26.22 W

Nautical Miles traveled in last 24 hrs:- 111

Our mileage is well down and we had to run the engine all night due to a total lack of wind but the up shot of this was we all enjoyed a good night’s sleep, no tossing or falling out of bed due to heeling over or big waves. We did hear that a number of boats are running about 120 miles north of us and were experiencing 40 knot winds, we are happy to be where we are!

For the first time all 4 of us were about this morning, which was nice, so Andrew did one of his famous fried breakfasts, though I don’t know if Paddy (Grainne) could quite get her head around an english breakfast!

With the engine being on for so long and as the sea was calm we decided to re-fill the main fuel tank, easy to do in these conditions, murder to do under sail with winds! We put in 20 gallons which filled them to the top so we are ready for anyhing. Naturally the generator is also full of fuel but as we ran the engine for so long yesterday and again over night, we havn’t had to run the generator, yet!

Today, being 5 days out of Bermuda, it was time to consider our overall position and stratagy and know how far we had come in actual fact and how much further to go. With the strong currents we are experiencing we were not too sure so here are the figures:-

Total Mileage through the water in 5 days: 734 Nautical Miles.
Total Mileage great circle route in 5 days: 615 Nautical miles

……………….you will notice the difference of 119 nautical miles that in fact we have sailed but actually stayed still!!!!! The good news is thgt most of the fleet are in the same positiuon.

The Bond film in todays BBC was “Live & Let Die” the first Roger Moore made and following this Paddy (Grainne) cooked dinner.Sheused the salted fish we bought as an experimemnt in Bermuda. A little salty but this was due to the fact we hadn’t soaked it long enough in water to clear the salt. Anyway werenjoyed ot with Garlic Rice and Spinach. It went down a treat and for future refrence, I willl buy salted fish again when we provision for a long passage. It had never occured to me before but it keeps so well.

This afternoon we made contact with another sailing boat(not part of the ARC) and they can download GRIB files on their Sat Phone: this musteither cost them a fortuneor they have found a supplierwho camsend compressedfiles;I wil try and find out tomorrow. Anyway they shared their GRIB file info with us, the bottom line is the earlier winds to the North of us are now gusting 50 Knots and are headed our way! We are now heading East/ still close to the rhum line, but are hoping the winds veer so we can take a course East,South East and get below 34 degrees by tomorrow night to avoid much of that bad weather coming through. By Friday it should have passed and no doubt we will be too far south for any other winds! So climbing back North East could be a struggle, so here we are “between a rock and a hard place”, dammed which ever waywe go: Exciting times though! More on this tomorrow no doubt but we are gearing up for a bad night tomorrw.

Position @1200 UTC

34? 42 .20 N 54? 33.76 W

Nautical Miles traveled in last 24 hrs:- 144

Aftera B awful night ofchanging wind patterns, rain, squalls, and high seas I came on watch at 0600 hrs expecting more of the same but no, rain stopped, seas calmed down and wind vanished, oh dear what’shappened!!! Ah yes, itis Sunday today, roast Chicken,Roast Potatoes and fresh veg, preceeded by Sherry on the upper terrace (cockpit!) andf ollowed by BBC, only this time Bondr Brandy & Coffee, so, this calmw was sent to help us do the cooking and enjoy ourselves; after all we were not going anywhere even with the engine as we were going against a1/2 to 1 1/2 knot curremntand what little windtherewas,wasright on the nose!

To accompany us we had the i Pod blaring out 6o’s music and the party was in ful swing. Poor Grainne, she must think she has joined a Lunatic institution what with Chris bopping and Andrew Gyratingn, and me, oh I was too busy holding on from falling over with laughing so much!!

Anyway, a very enjoyable day was had by all and the Bond film was “Diamonds are for Ever”. Following the clear up,we settled downback into watches, sails set for the night ready, just in case there is any wind and engine set. No one is expecting to go very far in terms of “distance over the ground” what with this current to contend with and what wind there is, is on the nose. “distance through the water” which the log produces is missleading under these circumstances.

So clear sky, no rain and night is upon us.