Day 9 Position 34 07.86 S 154 21.49 E 1200NZT

Mark_needler
Professional Skipper
Sun 27 May 2012 00:12
And just when you think it’s all over!!!!!!!!!!
 
24hrs run ~ 87.5
!!!
nms 27/05/2012
 
Quite a lot of drama this afternoon the waves were big and head too us and as one of them crash into us Steve heard a crack he found at the 2 portside aft Staunton's had sheered off there mounting studs and were in grave danger of letting go of the dinghy and the outboard. So we took the outboard off and stowed that in the starboard locker, Steve’s suggestion was to throw it overboard, to fair it was blowing well and we had bug seas! but i said lets out it the locker and take some weight off the davits. so with me standing on the transom and Steve in the cockpit we managed to get into the locker. Then we removed all the empty Jerry can’s and Bernie stowed them all in the forward cabin en suite. with this Steve and I tied and strapped the offending stanchions went around looking at all the Bimini , davits and stanchions,  joints and mountings to make sure they were all ok, during this we replaced a few bolts and tightened 80% of the fastenings. Only time will tell whether or not we have reduce the load enough!
 
After that just to add insult to injury the reefing line for the roller furling Genoa wound itself so tie under the actual mechanism it wouldn’t come in or release. So there I was for an hour and a half on the bow of the boat in 25 to 35 knot winds with 5 meter seas fixing it, sometimes on the bow sometime floating over it in mid air as the bow dropped into the next hole left by the last wave, in the end with Steve and Bernie's help we managed to drop the sail I cut the reefing line, removed the tangled line and re threaded the old line, however when we tried to hoist the sail in those wind we found we couldn’t and it was getting dangerous...not that the stuff wasn’t so we stowed the sail and will re attach it tomorrow weather permitting. I’ve done this job a number of times, I can honestly say it’s a shit load faster and easier in the marina!!1
 
Nice winds & day and apart from a massive current pushing us away from Sydney, I would say we would be there tomorrow..so I'll say we should be there tomorrow!
 
After all that i think we deserve a couple of cold ones when we tie up.
 
Cheers
 
Mark, Steve & Bernie