Angra do Heroismo, Ilha Terceira, Azores to Brittany 1221 miles. 47.52.56 N 04.07.19 W

Mandalay
Robin & Jenny Martin
Thu 5 Jul 2012 10:16


We left with SW winds 15 to 20 knots and here we are 3 days later with the same wind. Maymio is not at her best with a following wind and takes the gusts to get her going. Pelagia who are a 37' Najad swedish yacht started with us and are about 10 miles ahead of us on the 3rd day  and after 280 miles. We speak daily on HF and VHF when we are able to discuss the weather and sailing plan for the day. We are also  speaking to Herb each evening to get his advice on the weather.
The sailing of the two boats is very different, ours a heavy 42' needs more wind to push her along and is best with wind forward of the beam. No such luck so far but winds from behind are more comfortable and with the right rig can be very pleasant sailing.
Our 4th day forecast was for more of the same and even slackening off from the normal 15 to 20 knots. What we had had for most of the day was either 15 or 20 and not much in between so we were quite surprised to have 25/28 knots constant overnight. We had gone for the twin headsails for the day that like 20 to 25 knots so we buzzed along in the dark doing 7 or 8 knots most of the time. The seas got up too and seemingly coming from a number of different directions. Funny stuff this sea, one minute flowing one way and the next another way, even alternate waves coming from different directions. It will help our 24 hr run which was struggling to make 130 miles before night time.
Last night we heard the Euro Cup football results from Charlie on the Iridium phone so once again England lose on penalties.
Maymio is going well, only a small leak which I am yet to find where it is coming from. I thought it was from the calorifier ( hot water heater ) so I shut off our hot water only to discover it was salty water and the heater only uses fresh water. I now think it may be from the exhaust hose that has sea water cooling but I can't get to the join. It's only a drip so might have to put up with it till we get in. It might be the exhaust syphon for the cooling water but it seems to be working OK.
We don't know where we are going to make landfall yet, could be Brest, Benodet or the Scillies. We will make our mind up when we get nearer because Herb says that there is stronger winds in the channel at the time we might get there, in fact he is now predicting a gale.
Pelagia are now more than 40 miles ahead so VHF not working and have to revert to SSB for our nets. They are sailing much better with the wind on the stern. We plough on with our twin headsails but going more north to find some wind.
No such luck so decide to give up on the twins and go back to the orthodox sloop rig. We go much better because the wind comes round to the quarter but not only that but it pipes up to 26 kts. There we were thinking this is alright when the decision to reef or not is given it's normal airing and given all the factors we stuck with the full rig. The main one in my mind was that we were now 60 miles behind Pelagia, not a good reason.
Anyway it turned out all well because the wind died two hours later and we had made a speed of 9 knots in the process, trimming Pelagias lead ( we are not racing you know ) to 40 miles again.
The nightly conflab with Herb took a turn for the worse when he said stay below 45 North because of the gale, we were already there so I think he meant 47 N. No he meant 45 North as it turned out. Saw 3 fishing boats in the night which were probably fishing together because there wasn't much room to go by them, in the end we went straight through the middle  hoping they didn't have any nets strung out between them.
Both of us took avoiding action to track east just in case Herb was right about the gale.
We will see later?
Wednesday afternoon and a Spanish Border control vessel calls us up and we answer the usual questions on registration where have we come from and where are we going. We took the opportunity to ask about the predicted gale and were told that the centre of the low is 45N 20W heading easterly, that means we are in it's path. The plan now as we are at 45.20N 14.40W is to head east which will probably take us away from some of the strong stuff and take us closer to Benodet. We should get there Saturday evening and hopefully not too late for some moules and a nice crisp white wine. Meanwhile we prepare ourselves for a bit of a blow. Robbie hanks on the stay sail and Jens prepares the storm stew! Looking forward to a chat with Palegia later to see how much we have caught up as we have been sailing well today. The fishing hasn't gone well with 3 that managed to get away, the last one and the biggest took the whole line which broke off at the end of the reel. Still got the rod though.
I suppose you have to expect some bad weather on this trip especially when you have had a following wind for nearly all of it. This wind comes from the constant low pressures coming across the atlantic at this time of year and the Azores high pressure drawing them in. Most of these depressions land up  the UK and come round as often as one a week. They last about 24 hours and most have a gale near the centre. We were on the bottom of it after taking avoiding action on the advice of Herb. The warm front arrived on Wednesday evening and by then we had the reef in the sail and stay sail set. We knew it was going to be wind from behind us and a following sea so we were quite confident of the boat looking after us. After the edge of the storm coming from Bermuda to the Azores we knew we had been in worse conditions but a second reef might have been wise. As it turned out it was fine, big 20' waves coming up our chuff and passing beneath, one or two giving us a ride in the process. There were lots of shearwaters about having fun gliding and swooping in the wind. Even a pod of pilot whales, about 40 of them came with us for half an hour. We took some nice video so they will be good for the dark and stormy talk for the WI when we get back.
The wind was a constant 30 kts with gusts up to 40 kts so I hate to think what it was like in the middle of the depression. We made speeds of 9kts quite regularly and one surfing job of 13.3 kts.
The strong winds, only force 6 for most of the time, stayed with us for the whole 24 hours with occasional breaks in the clouds for the sun to break through. It's always seems more pleasant in the sunshine.
We did a cracking 170 miles in the 24 hours and caught up again with Pelagia now only 10 miles ahead. We were to get ahead in the rough weather the next day and when we poled out the staysail we were able to make a good course for Benodet.
Now under 200 miles to run and the shipping starts to appear, 4 of them in a lump so we went through the middle like the fishing trawlers. The sea is still big and pushing us all over the place but the auto helm bears up.
It wasn't until the penultimate day that the sea died down and the wind eased to 25 knots and under. We had a little party with a beer and loud music which the dolphins enjoyed as well.
Now more sail changes, the staysail away and back out with the genny and the pole again to make it flatter for the still following wind. We were still 10 miles ahead with a 100 miles to go but with the lighter winds we weren't confident to stay that way. Through the last night we were tweaking the sails  to make best use of the 16/20 knots.
First in buys the beers I said on the radio so no hurry.
With the spinnaker up we were able to keep them at bay and arrived in Benodet an hour ahead. 8 days of good sailing behind us , we were tired but really happy to be here and looking forward to a meal on dry land.
Now a couple of days rest and off round the coast to Laberwrach.

Photos
Twins and hydrovane doing the work while Jen relaxes.
Fog in the Azores.
Palegia and crew
After the final - the landlord was very happy.

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