Valent

So another week has gone by. We have completed 2 full weeks at sea and can almost smell the welcoming aromas of Grenada and the Caribbean. At the time of writing we have passed below Barbados and are currently north of Tobago. I expect to sight land around 02:00 on 4 Dec and we expect to finish around first light.

In the last week we have had some great sailing, initially under the Bora, and then as the wind became stronger and more gusty reverting to a conventional white sails plan. Our last 10 days have averaged around 150nm per day which is what we would have expected for the total trip. We also had the fastest boat in the ARC sail past us a couple of days ago and had a very cordial chat on the VHF. Berencice Cube is a 90ft Swan (so about twice the size of Valent) and was travelling in race mode, so big sails and around 7 people up on watch and going twice as fast as us (and that was slow for them). Our sunsets have also started to improve as we get further west and find less squall activity.

Events of the last week include fixing the generator, doing more work with the sextant and getting better at catching fish. Last weekend the generator ceased to function correctly. After doing all of the basic stuff (change fuel filter, air filter, check oil and cooling system) the generator would still not run correctly, cutting out after around 10 mins. Further work and investigation (trying different things) lead to checking all of the relay switches. I decided that the fuel pump relay switch looked old and less than perfect so popped a new on in. Result. The generator now runs and charges the batteries.

During the week I did some more sun sights and 1 evening fixed our position using the stars and Jupiter. After dealing with some basic arithmetic errors (e.g. I somehow did 36 – 26.2 = 15.8!) I achieved a good result putting us within 5 miles of our GPS position. It was enjoyable to start shooting the stars again, Deneb and Vega were just as bright and easy to identify as I remember from my previous days of astro-navigation (a long time ago).

The fish have started to bite with greater regularity. We lost a large Dorado (also known as Mahi mahi or Dolphin fish) which broke the swivel, but have subsequently landed 2 decent sized ones today. 2 days ago we got a 10kg yellow fin tuna. Big enough to produce 15 generous steaks and leave a big bag of the rest for making tuna tartare and probably a pasta dish.

Tonight we will be eating tuna again, I am going to use up the last of my fresh ingredients to do a version of a Rick Stein recipe – char-grilled tuna on a warm salad of green beans, garlic & tomato. Perhaps do some soy & lime noodles to go with it. Lunch will be breaded dorado wraps served with a lemon garlic mayo & capers.

All being well breakfast will be alongside tomorrow morning. I have specially reserved the best bacon and half a dozen eggs to ensure monster butties to celebrate. The beer is also chilling and maybe something fizzy as well.

Here we are on the 10th day out and finally crossed the half way point. We are about a day and a half behind expectations, but not all is gloom and doom. Over the last 48hrs we have made good progress and already clawed back a day or so. Currently I am looking at arriving on the evening of 3 Dec, but this is still very sensitive to our average speeds.

We have celebrated half way by having showers. The crew had the choice of hot water and privacy with the camping bag, or the deck shower at the back of the boat. The fragrance levels of the boat have improved dramatically. Some of the crew have even washed their clothes.

Whilst each day is fundamentally the same, same view, same sun, same people we do find other ways to change it up. Food plays a big part of this, as do sail changes, boat jobs and interactions with other boats. As well as the SSB radio net, when we get close enough to another boat we often have a short chat on the VHF. A few days ago Norah one of the family boats was a few hours away and Lucy got to have a chat on the VHF with Johanna. Another task that fills in some time is keeping Lucy’s hair under control. We’ve now washed it twice and it is looking good.

Last Thursday as darkness fell we came across a yacht that appeared to be drifting and was certainly acting erratically. The yacht did not respond to our calls on VHF and did not appear to be part of the ARC+ fleet (not showing on the trackers). The boat had no AIS and at the time no lights. Concerned that they may have been in need to assistance we dropped our sails and motored back to intercept them. The vessel finally responded after being illuminated by torchlight. The vessel reported that they were OK but had no autopilot. He also asked if he was showing on AIS to which we responded negative. Having satisfied ourselves that the vessel was not requesting assistance we resumed our course under sail.

Thursday night saw the wind threatening to rise to challenging levels, so at midnight we conducted a sail change, dropping the Bora and reverting to white sails. We kept that going until yesterday morning when with decreasing winds we switched back to the Bora which is still flying as I speak. Sailing at night is currently extremely pleasurable, with the temperature a pleasant 25degrees or so and a lovely moon lighting the way.

Another activity that was proving frustrating, but has provided timely intervention is fishing. It’s Friday and it’s Amberjack time. Friday afternoon saw us finally start to catch fish and we caught 4 Amberjack that afternoon, 3 of which we kept. They made for a delicious supper last night and we still have some in the freezer. Yesterday we caught a couple of Tuna, and though 1 escaped the other was a decent size. I made Tuna Tartare for lunch which we served in wraps. The flavour was absolutely amazing.

We have also had some onboard stowaways. We previously had been visited by a bird that looked like an egret. Well the egret returned and spent a couple of days on board. Despite calling it an egret we weren’t convinced, but following research and ‘phone a friend’ (thanks Jane) it is confirmed as a Great Egret, possibly a juvenile. But the reals news was that 1 became 2. We thought that we were going to start a breeding programme. It was very sweet. Our passenger spotted the other bird looking lost and struggling, left the boat, quick meet/greet and possibly a mating ritual before leading and showing the new friend how to land on a moving boat. They stayed with us for a few hours and then left together to start a new life somewhere better than a yacht in the ocean. All that was left for me was to clean up the guano and throw away the food they rejected (sardine paste I might add). S0me guests are just so ungrateful.

I have also got the sextant out and blown away the cobwebs. Today I am only plotting our position based on my sun sights (but am checking that the answers look sensible). Having now done 3 sights including a noon sight I am feeling very pleased with myself. My noon sight gave a Latitude of 13 Degrees 38.8N and the GPS gave 13 Degrees 39.43N. A difference of about 0.6nm. When I have practised my sun sights a bit more then I will move on to do some Star sights.

Progress has now picked up, and our current estimate for arrival is evening on 3 Dec. That does however require us to keep a SOG up of around 6kts, very feasible given we have around 1kn of current pushing us along and still have full tanks of diesel.

We are now 4 days into our Atlantic crossing and life is very sedate and hot. The winds are light and we have only covered around 440 miles towards Port Louis, St George’s, Grenada, our destination which is still around 1730 miles distant. All this means that the closest human ‘habitation’ to us is the ISS. In comparison to our trip from Las Palmas to Cape Verde we are already a day behind. The good news is that there is wind forecast to arrive in the next 12 hours or so.

The light winds from behind have given us the opportunity to get out the new Bora parasail and become familiar with it. The sail works wonderfully, and even in 5-7kn of wind we are able to fill it and not have flogging sails. The sail likes the wind to be behind us and can be used until the breeze starts becoming a Force 4/5. At that point we have to get it down and revert to our solid white sails plan. One of the big advantages of the Bora is that you do not need a mainsail, so any danger of crash gybing and causing serious injury/damage from the flying boom is removed.

On board we are split into a watch system. We have approximately 12 hours of dark and 12 hours of light. We decided that at night we would have 2 people on watch, but day watches would be single person (there is always someone else around if needed). All watches are 3 hours, so at night it is 3 hours on, 3 hours off. We have also come up with a rota that rotates the pairs each night, it should help to create a bit of interest. After our trip to Cape Verde the guys decided that I should not be in the daytime watches (the 3 single watches) allowing me to focus on Catering, Lucy, Navigation, Radio, Boat jobs and general admin. I am also the first on call person to assist with any daytime watch.

On the catering front we have so far had freshly baked bread each morning, a lemon drizzle cake and today orange&raisin cupcakes. I also used up a mango that was disappointingly unripe and some oranges that were not keeping as well as expected to make some Mango&Orange chutney. Meals so far have included Avocado, Egg Mayo & Bacon wraps, Fresh fish and Burger night. The burgers I bought in Las Palmas proved to be of such high quality that no one could manage more than 1, so we will have the second one tonight. After 2 weeks out from Las Palmas we are onto the last of our fresh milk. In the next day or so the crew will be on Almond Milk until Grenada. We have also pickled some more beetroot and a bag of fresh chillies we managed to pick up in Mindelo. Beetroot will soon be our staple vegetable as I managed to find some pre cooked vacuum packed beetroot in Las Palmas with a 2 month shelf life.

On the wildlife side we have seen lots and lots of flying fish, but so far only 1 has deigned to present itself to us. Yesterday we were visited by a massive school of Dolphins. They came and played with us from all angles, conservatively a hundred were nipping in and out and in some cases producing spectacular jumps. We have sighted a Cape Verde Petrel and had a visit from a lost Egret. We also had a spectacular show of a float of tuna flashing past, leaping out of the water as they pursued a shoal of flying fish.

Yesterday we also all treated ourselves to a shower using the camping shower. This clever contraption holds upto 20Ltr of water in a bladder. One side of the bladder is black and you place the filled bag in the sun, black side up. After 1-2 hours you have a shower bag of hot water. The great news is that is the water allowance for your shower. Today we went for an even bigger treat, Hands to Bathe. We snuffed the Bora sail, disengaged everything and let Valent drift. After setting up a rope and fender we then took turns to jump in and have a short swim. Somehow we had managed to stop on the summit of a 3000M underwater mountain, but despite Lucy’s efforts she still failed to touch the bottom – it was still around 2,000M below us, with the wider basin having depths approaching 6,000M in places.

There are a few other yachts in our vicinity, mostly around 5 miles or so away, so just visible, but occasionally our paths cross. Yesterday we had a pleasant encounter with Why Not, a Norwegian boat flying a very patriotic asymmetric sail. Each day we try and stay in touch with as many boats as possible across the fleet using the Single Sideband Radio (SSB). This uses a mixture of Short Wave, Medium Wave and High Frequency. Without going into the details each frequency transmits in different patterns bouncing of the earths atmosphere giving much longer range communications than a standard VHF radio. It is possible to reach stations thousands of miles away. The SSB allows the fleet to have a chat, swap weather, position data and anything else of interest. It allows many users to all participate at the same time, and can even allow for email using a good old fashioned modem. The radio net is done every day at the same time 11:00, specified in UTC (or for the more traditional reader GMT). We did a clock change last night so are currently at UTC(-2), or 2 hours behind the UK.

There are various ways to follow us at sea and to also see how other boats are living. The Yellow Brick tracker is very easy, and if you go to the YB Races App in the App Store you can follow the whole fleet in real time. When loaded just choose ARC+2023 fleet. Also, on the World Cruising Website they host daily updates and post short blogs from various boats. You can find the latest blogs at: https://www.worldcruising.com/dailylogs.aspx Wishing you all the best and I hope that next time I post we will have posted plenty of daily mileages in excess of 150nm.

What a great stopover. Whilst we only saw a very small section of the Cape Verde archipelago it proved to be very interesting and extremely welcoming. The Cape Verde Islands consist of around 10 volcanic islands covering an area of around 150square miles. The last eruption was 2014 on Fogo. We visited Sao Vicente in the Northern cluster. Of the islands, 7 are arid and 3 get all the rain. This is due to the 3 tallest islands trapping the clouds and stealing all the rain. Our guide explained that Sao Vicente had recently gone 6 years without rain, and when it did rain, often it was very heavy so just swept away the top soil and did not soak into the ground. The close by island of Santo Antao is lush, green and capable of growing lots of crops.

Mindelo became one of the largest towns in Cape Verde because it has the largest natural harbour protected from most angles. The problem is water. Years ago water came from bore holes and shipping across from Santo Antao. Now they have desalination plants, but these only serve Mindelo and the largest towns. The majority of the rural residences rely on bore holes which unfortunately have a habit of drying up. The Cape Verde islands are part of Africa and only gained their independence around 1980. Before that they were loosely part of Guinea-Bissau and before that had hundreds of years of Portuguese rule. Having been through a communist phase, the Cape Verde islands became fully democratic around 1991.

A 10 min walk from the marina was a lovely beach, with gentle breaking waves, albeit with a steep descent into the sea. 3 steps in and you were out of your depth. The water was warm, around 28 degrees but felt cool after the heat of the sun.

As nearly all the boats arrived earlier than expected the family boats got together and arranged a morning trip to swim with turtles. This proved to be a wonderful experience, Lucy rates the day as incredible. After a short bus ride we boarded boats and were then ‘launched’ through the surf and taken a short distance to the turtle area. Here we were at liberty to swim for around 30 mins with a strict no touching rule. However the turtles were allowed to touch you, and Lucy got touched 3 times. Afterwards the kids had great fun playing in the large surf.

Many thanks to Tijs Crezee from Vivace for the wonderful turtle photo.

Other activities whilst in Mindelo included a drinks reception, prize giving party and of course making sure that Lucy’s education continued. Oh, and Lucy went to Freya’s birthday party and had a great time doing beach games and having a birthday picnic.

We departed Mindelo yesterday, Friday 17 November at 12:00. It was a bit hectic for the first few miles as all the boats jostled for clean air and tried to head out to sea. The lovely people on Epiphany, (Matt & Abi and the children Freya & Lydia) sent me these 2 photos of Valent having fun on the departure.

We are now around 100 miles from Cape Verde, making around 5 kts in the right direction. We will post further updates from our Atlantic crossing with news of life on board.

Valent has made good progress along the route to Cape Verde. We passed the half way mark last night (Tue night) while charging along at an average speed of 9kts. Valent touched 15kts at one point and the wind regularly reached 30kts (Force 7). We breathed a sigh of relief as daylight returned and we could see the waves before they grabbed us and chucked us on our way. The biggest swell was around 6M. The hydrovane has needed a bit of assistance steering the boat in the conditions. We have now adjusted our sail plan to enable us to sail deeper (more downwind) to save us having to do a long gybe later.

Before departing Las Palmas we spent a hectic few days getting the final preparation done. Suzy and Alex took charge of going to the supermarket while we busied ourselves on board with final preparations and crew briefings. It was a relief to finally set sail and get the chance to relax at sea. We came up with ingenious storage solution for lots of items, the bananas found a lovely home on the comms pole.

Talking of comms, one of the last decisions we made was to install Starlink. Starlink is the new satellite communications system from Elon Musk. It has proved to revolutionary. I am posting this blog from the middle of the ocean with download speeds better than at home for just £2/GB. The above photo shows the iteration of yacht communications systems. The ‘ladder’ up the backstay is the SSB aerial. Back in the 1970/1980s this was the only long range method of communicating at sea. The system could do email via a modem (remember those) and provided radio communication out to around 16,000 miles. Our SSB still works and we use it each day to communicate with the rest of the fleet who are spread out over around 100nm. The Thales dish is the Certus 700 satellite comms from iridium and was state of the art in 2020. However, it is expensive to run and only gives download speeds of upto 700kB/s. The rectangular dish is the Starlink, and we are regularly getting 22Mb/s, over 3000% faster (and at fraction (0.015%) of the cost of Iridium). Also on the pole is a Navtex dish, (1990 technology), Iridium Yellow Brick Tracker (2020) and an active radar reflector (Echomax) (2020). There is also a spare VHF aerial which we currently use for the AIS which enables us to be seen by other vessels and tracked by Marine Traffic.

Time is spent managing the boat and the mind. We are running 2 man watches at night and single watches during the daytime. Watches are 3 hours on, 3 off. This system allows us to rotate the pairs for the night watches so that you don’t get bored with the same person. It also allow each watchkeeper to have 1 day off in 4. A popular activity for Neil and Mike is crosswords. Lucy is enjoying herself and has found new ways to enjoy being rocked by the boat.

All being well we will arrive in Mindelo before Saturday, though we may well be arriving in the dark. Tonight we are going to have a Chicken casserole. Previous meals have been Beef Stir Fry, Chorizo&Pasta Salad and Bolognese. Meals are determined by the sea state, and at present we can only manage meals that can be served in bowls and do not require a knife!