" A LADY TRIP " Sailing around the World,, ( presently sailing from the Dutch West Indies to the San Blas Islands) distance 645n miles

A Lady
Stephen Hyde
Sat 16 Jan 2010 16:28
FRIDAY 15th January 2010
 
07.00hrs  We were all on deck ,having doged a very shower and by now the wind had moderated to a more comfortable 32knots,
               We had covered 211 miles in the 24hrs since we left port.
08.30      We were approx 45 miles north of Columbia, we now had to gybe onto port in big sea's, so this operation took the guts of 30mins
              being very carefull not to do any damage to the boat.
 
09.30     We ran the generator for a few hours to charge up the batteries . The boat has 11 batteries in total,  3 no 12v batteries & 8 no 24v batteries.
             These batteries run the ship, the lights, the plug sockets, the electric cooker, the a/c system, the washing machine, fridges, freezer
             T.V. , auto helm, winches, windlass, and hydrolics, plus radio's, navigation systems, computers, and a host of other stuff.
             When we are at sea , we usually have to run the generator between 4 and 6 hours per day. the generator is a 19hp westerbeke diesel engine
             and produces about 8kva. 
 
11.00     Our course today is 236 T  distance remaining to the San Blas Isl is 400miles
                                                     distance travelled                                  231miles
                                                     wind speed                                           20knots
 13.00  we had a salad for lunch, and later the skipper finished reading the " THE BANKERS " book,  frightning,
 
16.00   We hooked a large fish, in fact so big we could hardly reel the begger in. After struggling with the fish for about  1 hour
           ( and we could see it jumping about 500m behind ) we lost him ,in fact he broke off the hook .  ahhhhhh what a pity
           THE ONE THAT GOT AWAY
 
Donal made the dinner and that was devoured in the cockpit, but ( always a BUT ) the bloody wind was rising all the time along with the sea's
so we rolled in 2 reef's in the Mainsail; and headsail,
 
By 22.oohrs , the wind was now a steady 40 knots, gusting to 48 knots
Kevin and Donal were on watch untill 02.oo and Stephen and Aileen were on duty from 02.00 to 07.00
 
01.30 a huge rogue broke over the boat and filled the cockpitwith sea water and much of it came in through the hatch and drenched the works
         down below..
 
Later the Skipper and Aileen witnessed a mean 45 knots , gusting 54 knots regularly, at this stage we got all hands on deck, started the engine
and put the boat head to wind and rolled up the Mainsail and the Yankee , THE SEA's were huge , so we put up the Staysail and returned to our course
We touched 14.6 knots at on stage while sliding down a wave,...This caused vertical walls of water along the whole length of the boat and was amazing.
Our grib file told us we would have a stiff breeze, around 30knots,  They underestimated a little on that one and we were on the verge of putting
on the BROWN  TROURSERS, but then,  "" A  LADY " stood the test well.
 
07.00hrs, Donal appeared in the hatch and relieved Aileen and Stephen. happy to get into the bunk  zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz