20th November 3rd Day at Sea
Muktinath
Pete and Chris
Fri 20 Nov 2015 12:07
12:00 - 20 Nov 2015
Distance run today: 132miles
Total distance run: 275 miles
Had a great day yesterday - for the first half!
As night fell conditions deteriorated rapidly. The wind got up to around 30 knots and the sea state became very lumpy and confused.
Two things happened:
Whilst trying to gybe the genoa we got into a bit of a mess and ended up with the sheets wrapped round the forestay. This necessitated a lengthy and bouncy trip up to the foredeck to untangle stuff.
Shortly after that there were a couple of very loud bangs. Whether these we caused by us falling off the top of a particularly large wave or by hitting something is not clear. The result was clear though. The autopilot and steering had been damaged. At first we thought the rudder had been bent in some horrible way, and we decided to limp back to the Canaries. Further investigation revealed that the rudder mechanics were OK, but the sensor which feeds rudder positioning to the display and to the autopilot had been moved.
We have manged some basic re-calibration of the sensor unit, sufficient for us to restart our course. We will need to move the sensor at some point, but will wait until the sea state settles down.
Sailing hey? Hours of boredom interspersed with panic...