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.
I am intrigued.. is that a kite cut to be used with out a main or just well pinned in to keep it stable?.. loving the blog..Nic
Hi Nic, We fly the Bora sail without the Main. It is symmetrical with a ‘wing flap’. As the breeze builds the flap creates an up-force lifting the bow as well as allowing the stronger gusts to ‘escape’. We are happy handling it downwind upto around 20kts true. On a wind angle of 120-150 we reckon 15kts true is a realistic max, (partly to do with how easy it is to snuff). http://www.oxley-sails.com for more details. Our learning so far is that we are very unlikely to use it for wind angles forward to the beam despite the literature. Obviously once the wind is 15kts and around 120 then the white sails do a good job and provide a more resilient sail plan.
Quite an interesting sail, I remember some model boats of my youth.. pre remote control and wind vane steered, used to have holes in much the same as a parachute so they could keep some flow even when oversheeted as far as a normal kite was concerned (no trimmer on a 32 inch yacht). I see what you mean about some of the angles in the advertisement
Quite an interesting sail, I remember some model boats of my youth.. pre remote control and wind vane steered, used to have holes in much the same as a parachute so they could keep some flow even when oversheeted as far as a normal kite was concerned (no trimmer on a 32 inch yacht). I see what you mean about some of the angles in the advertisement
The catering certainly sounds yummy! How amazing to swim on the middle of the Atlantic. I hope you find some wind soon.
Long may the good conditions last, soooo envious, I think! Can’t wait to hear more.
Yours sounds like the best fed crew in the fleet. That was to be expected though of course! Really great to see a video of the action.
Thought that was so much as expected I didn’t comment on it!
safe Travels. sounds like quite the adventure!
Nice cakes! Any fishing yet?
No serious fishing yet Kate. 2 reasons, a lack of flying fish as bait and too much food in the fridge to use up first. I think we will start to make an effort to catch fish tomorrow.