Bermuda....eventually
Chiscos - Atlantic Cruise
John Simpson
Sun 13 May 2012 11:04
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32:22.73n 064:40.264w
 Skipper exhausted after a hard night! We decided to
bring the parasailor down for the night which turned out to be a very wise
decision. Just as John went on watch he was heard to say 'I
think it's going to rain in a minute'... Precisely one minute later the
heavens opened, the thunder was rumbling and the lightening flashing all
around us! Unfortunately we were goose winged with
the genoa poled out and a preventer on the main so we had no choice
but to run with it until the conditions subsided enough for us to reef the
sails. By this time it was dawn and as the wind had calmed
a little, we were desperate to reach Bermuda quickly and in style so the
parasailor went up again. The skipper decided this was his
moment to grab forty winks but alas the weather had other
ideas! The pressure fell quickly and the clouds looming
behind us did not look very friendly at all. The crew were reluctant to
wake the skipper but we eventually realised it was not going to
get any better. We somehow managed to get the beast (our
beloved parasailor) down in 28-30 knots of wind and just in the nick of time as
the weather turned into a real storm. At this stage we just had
the genoa out. With the wind reaching 45 knots and being
consistently in the 30s, Chiscos was bombing along and surfing down the
waves.
 The crew pleased to be finally
approaching 'sunny' Bermuda! Ten miles away from our
destination, the storm died and the wind swung round to the
north - exactly the direction we needed to go so we
resigned ourselves to motor the last few miles. Our GPS told us we
were 3 miles from the entrance to Bermuda yet we still could not see any
land. We wondered how in the past the ships without any
electronics managed to navigate in such circumstances and also felt lucky
not to have been struck by lightening which could have wiped it all
out!
 After a loooong and decent nights sleep we were ready and raring to
get into the swing of Bermudan life and back to our duties of getting ready
for the next adventure. We filled up with fuel, which was essential
as we had motored some 65 hours in total!
Its not all been such hard work however, and we managed
to relax and have a 'couple' of beers at the pirate party last night. It
was great to see all the other crews and also our friends from the ARC on Time
Bandit who we haven't seen since Christmas.  Towards the end of the night the skipper got slightly carried away with
Felix from The Pinta! Notice that the precious beer bottle is somehow
still vertical, not a drop to be wasted!
 We also managed to find a banjo player and another violinist, so
provided our headaches get better we might have a musical
afternoon. Our main priority now though is to recover in time for the
prize giving (ie. more drinks) tonight! Today is probably our only day
for a bit of R & R as tomorrow (Monday) we need to make a start on
our never ending jobs list, which now includes finding a welder to fix the
cracked exhaust box and locating a new gasket head fitting for the
engine. So we're not partying all the time...honest!
Mikaela & Corinne
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