It is not all about the Steering

Juno
Fri 28 Nov 2014 16:14
20:25.86N 025:02.70W

Day Five (or Six?) at Sea - 28/11/14

For those of you in the UK I thought you might like to know that the crew are shirtless and perspiring gently - apart from Doc Baines MA Oxon etc, etc...who ignoring all medical advice got sunburnt yesterday. The broomstick holding the "cake-box" steering mechanism in position and stable is working well (as at 16.02 GMT). We have considered replacing it with Grannie Homan's Life Enhancing Fruitcake. Her's may do a better job of steering without all the noise.

We are now 200nm from the Cap Verdes, not quite rowing distance but feeling a little more comfortable. Great excitement in the Engineering Department as an axe was found in the tool kit - a use will be found for it. Remodelling of Juno is currently underway.

After a fruit salad lunch we were deployed to lick decks. Stoker Second Class Curtis Hayward spent a happy afternoon on the foredeck filing down 12 stainless steel bolts with a nail-file only to be told that the self-tacking track would not be in use again this trip. Engineering Dept consulted their union rep but were pacified by orange squash - with ice in it!

Nav-Man and Doc are currently fighting it out in the heat below decks to prepare a curry. Shapla would be gutted. So may we.To be continued.

Paul has edited his PhD - a little.

You see....it is not all about the steering. (Please see Engineering Dept fix in photo.)



We are now 200nm from Sao Vicente, one of the Cap Verde Islands. These islands, about 400nm off the coast of Africa, were once a Portuguese colony but now are independent and, though poor, constitute a stable Republic.

We are heading for the only marina in the island chain to meet up with a Discovery engineer at 4.00 p.m. tomorrow (Saturday). he will have a full replacement for the steering gear that seems to be defective. With luck, he will have us on our way again by Sunday night. We have done the maths and we think this episode will have cost us 250nm of extra sailing and a day in port (about 2.75 days). Given that we were a bit ahead of the bunch, we should manage to come in with many other ARC boats.

Some readers had a few thoughts about diseases and pirates. Apparently no dengue fever, no malaria, no Ebola but a local volcano - on another island 100nm away - has gone pop and required some local evacuation. It is always about volcanos! There are defo no pirates but we will be on full security alert when in the harbour against small children who are expert pick-pockets. Our stay will be approx 24 hours only.