Our nearly last night sail

CARANGO AMEL 54 #035
PETER and VICKY FORBES
Sat 18 Mar 2017 12:53

12:02.49N 061:45.18W

What a night of hold your breath sailing we have had. Hold your breath because we decided to fly the wonderful mizzen staysail all night with somewhat flukey winds in both strength and direction. So we are gliding along now at 2 in the morning with brilliant moonlight on a fairly calm black sea at 6 - 8 knots unbelievably smoothly. Each time there is a tiny change of wind the huge sail collapses and fills again with a smack and if one holds one’s breath it strongly pulls Carango forward again. The process to repeat itself with sometimes as long as 15 minutes between each cycle - and we forge on forward towards Grenada.

We have just overtaken the huge American catermaran Paradise Found. We are passed the pirate area and all seems well for a midday landing in Port Louis.  

Shortly after the above was written I began to notice a rather large blackish cloud following us on our starboard beam. I watched it for a while and established that it was coming our way. Vicky had sone to bed some hour or so earlier so I was reluctant to wake her. I reefed the Yankee and the Mizen sail but of course handing the staysail is a 2 man job - what to do? Then before I really had chance to consider more in came the wind. The staysail was magnificent and held on well - pulling us along at up to 9.5 knots [there is no current here]. A thrilling ride ensued during which the autopilot was overcome and I had to hand steer. We careered along at between 8 and 10 knot with some radical changes of wind direction which I had no option but to follow.

I glanced astern to see the American cat lit up like a Christmas tree - so they were having difficult sail changes as well.

Vicky awoke and we decided to hand the staysail after a few more thrilling moments of spectacular progress towards Grenada. Our last night had thrown in a big googly. Taking this sail down in such a wind is a challenge but we managed it and of course the wind dropped away and we should have chanced it a left it alone. But once down I was certainly not going to risk it again. We sailed on with reefed yankee and Mizzen.

The night threw in one final trick: After an hour so the wind dropped and we decided to motor sail in. I had just turned in for a snooze and was falling into a deep sleep. On came a red warning light on the Volvo engine control panel, which thank goodness Vicky noticed. The auxiliary drive fan belt had broken. So out with the tool box luckily we had a spare and the special spanner to do this job. So I climbed down into engine room and got very hot and dirty. We motor sailed in. Friday 18th March 21017.