Richards Bay Arrival
Beez Neez now Chy Whella
Big Bear and Pepe Millard
Mon 11 Nov 2019 09:50
|
28:47.640 S 32:04.738 E
Richards Bay
Arrival
 I went to bed at six as usual and
fell into a very deep sleep with twenty nautical miles to go and not going very
quickly....... Bear woke me at eight so I could come too sufficiently to take us
in. I came out to a semi rinse cycle and tried hard to get a picture of one of
the huge swells that came from behind and ‘surfed us’ or the odd wave that
crested beside us. I missed so many white horses and the picture above is a bit
shabby but it does show the grey morning, misty and
damp.
 It began to rain quite hard but
eventually I could see the right-hand breakwater. I
radioed Port Control but the nice lady told me to contact her when we were a
mile off. I was steering hard to the right to maintain a straight line and with
twenty-two knots of wind this was fast turning into number two behind the fight
we had to enter West Palm Beach, Florida (that was more of a Grace Darling
experience than this).
 The radio chirped and the kind Port
Officer asked me the usual (how many persons on board, where did we come from,
our nationality) and gave us permission to enter. A yacht came on to tell us
there was space on the commercial dock but Trevor came on to offer us a place
next to Slow Flight. On we went.
 Our entry. (I took this picture later
on). The boat seen is Nehaj (Suzanne the
German single-hander). Our track is the pink line.
 Once in the smooth water beyond the
breakwater I slowed so Bear could gets ropes and fenders ready. A turn right at
a cruise ship, a slow pass of several big tugs, a swift turn left and there we
were in the marina. Turn right before the huge concrete finger and there were
Kimi and Trevor waving furiously in welcome. Beez Neez is the yacht in the
picture with the blue line coming off her beak. We did it. YEHAA and YAY.
 Our
journey. A direct line from Baly Bay to Richards Bay is about 1100
nmiles. Considering our detour toward Bazaruto and the eighteen hours we hove to
and drifted the 1316 nmiles we actually did doesn’t seem too bad. Done in 270:15
hours gives us an overall average of 4.87 knots an hour. Engine on for a total
of 112:40 (plus 2:00 randomly charging up) was a bit more than we thought we
would but previous boats had warned us all that “there is a lot of motoring”.
This journey brings our total since leaving Plymouth to 38,296 n
miles.
 Beez
Neez safely rafted up against Slow
Flight.
ALL IN ALL VERY THRILLED
INDEED
WE HAVE CROSSED THE INDIAN OCEAN
YEHAA |