Hello All and apologies for not writing for a few days, I guess the truth is that I didn’t want to make it sound like I was spending all my time fixing things as that seemed unprofessional and I didn’t want to whine about broken bits and pieces. However, in truth I am out here on a small boat, that I did a lot of work to last winter, but in retrospect I did too much in some areas and not enough in others and that has meant I have had lots of annoying and sometimes scary things to work out.
I have been keeping myself focused and working on my problems and am happy to report that (at least for now!!) I am on top of things and I think we are doing better on the race course as well. I got pretty pissed off with things over the weekend. I had played the low aggressively by getting north only to see it fly by so far south that I only had 20 hours of breeze and only half of that was really windy, the good news is that it was all from astern, it topped out at 40 knots and I had just the main with 2 reefs in it. However, that started the comeback on the race course and after some lighter winds today I am in good shape.
Gear wise I was sailing along nicely with the A5 chute up in about 20 knots of breeze over the weekend and for some reason (which must have been operator error) the tack line jammer came open and I ended up with the chute filed 30 feet to leeward, and my lovely little “King of Shaves” was laid over flat in the middle of the ocean with water only feet away from the open hatch. I didn’t have the washboard in…..I dived to leeward and fired the sheet, which half improved things and half made them worse, I had to get up front and fight the chute down which thankfully I was able to do after a big bear away. Not sure if I kicked the jammer open or what, but that had the potential to be a major disaster. The kite did get ripped (about a 4 foot tear) so I had to lay that out all over the floor and glue it back together, (now done - and thanks to Gerry at Sailcare in Cowes for my sail repair kit) . I also had a 3 foot split in the mainsail at the leech under the 3rd reefing point that appeared after the big blow, so I had to drop the main and fix that as well, most of my sticky kevlar repair tape is gone…(but it lasted longer than my oreo’s!! Ha ha ha!)
The biggie however was my batteries, well my newly installed smart charger to be accurate. We fitted a smart charger in the spring which puts higher voltage into the batteries when you first start the charging process, and allows a full charge to be achieved in about 45 minutes. To go with this was an updated monitor, which gave more read out on electrical usage and battery status. It was always odd that despite the new system the batteries never got to 100% charge but the electricians told us this was because the monitor wasn't calibrated. Needles to say we should have dug deeper, as on Saturday morning the charging system failed completely. In the end I wired the alternator straight to the battery, and cut out the relays, and that fixed it, but not without a lot of anguish over about 6 hours. No battery charging = no race. No race = unhappy Osc!!!!
The AIS system also went down and that took 8 hours of tracking down till a loose connection was found. The failure of the AIS took down the chart plotter, as the chart plotter had been running off the AIS' internal GPS since the sea talk error on the instruments earlier this week took out its primary source of GPS data. Damn I was tired after all that and emotionally poooppped and need a bit of time to get my act back together. It was then that the low blew past me and it wasn’t until I gybed and effectively turned left off the corner of Newfoundland that my spirits started to rise again. I have to also say that I rode the e biggest wave ever over the night of the big low, in the trough of the wave I was pointing up at 45 degrees to point at the top of the wave going away from me. I hand steered that bit, FREEEZING and daunting rather than out and out scary but FAST!!!!!!!!!! I don’t know how I am going to feel about all of this when I finish. The waves are indescribable to a sailor who hasn’t been out here. All the pic’s of the waves, all of the words aren’t enough to describe the feeling of being on such a monster wave, on your own in a little boat surfing at 20 knots +.
Saw a BIG whale, 50 dolphins in a pod (with babies!) and had a close run thing with a fishing boat that kindly steered around my transom by 400 yards. Race wise I am in this race and planning in pushing really hard for the next few days. I think I am back leading my class but want to get closer to Hannah and Jerry. Mind you it seems like the faster boats just can’t drop the Sigma’s. What is all that about? I knew they rated low but they are also damn close behind. Well sailed Will and Marco!
Thanks for reading this long blog and for ALL your emails which have been great to read. I appreciate them all. Oh, and I found that diesel smell at last…on the collar of my oily jacket. NO WONDER I COULD NEVER GET AWAY FROM IT!!!
Over and out for Monday. Wind now 14 knots SW and I am doing 6.7 through the water but 8.3 over the ground so must be a nice current with me as well. Steering 270 and position at midnight GMT Monday was N 44 43.687 W 51 88.994
If you enjoy this website why not make a donation to The Institute of Cancer Research. For more information visit our Charities page.