Antigua!!!

Meryon.bridges
Wed 16 Dec 2009 14:19
We've arrived.  19 days and 1 hour, quite a quick passage, and we're immensely pleased to be here.  Great experience.
 
However all did not run as smoothly as previous blogs suggested it would.  Having crossed 99.8% of the Atlantic we had a drama on the last night when a mere 40 miles from destination.  At about five o'clock in the morning the wind speed went from about 25 knots to 56 knots in the course of 5 minutes, as an unseen squall bore down on us out of the blackness of the night.  That's Force 5 to Force 11!  We were caught with one person on watch - Peter M, and sails suitable for a moderate breeze, mainsail out on one side, Genoa poled out on the other side.  Suddenly all was noise and confusion.  Flossy lost control, Peter siezed the wheel as John and Meryon groped for trousers below.  With a huge bang the genoa sheet parted (breaking strain about 5 tons) and suddenly the genoa was flogging madly in the storm.  Unbalanced by the removal of the pull of the genoa the mainsail gybed, slammimg across from one side to the other.  John and Meryon got the genoa rolled up and Meryon then went forward to get in the pole and sort the chaos on the foredeck.  Meanwhile the boat gybed again with a second resounding crash.  The wind was beginning to ease and the lashing rain thinned.  We reduced the mainsail to a tiny triangle and set part of the Staysail, by which time the wind was back to a moderate breeze.
 
In the light of day we found that of the three wires which secure the main sheet to the boom, two had parted in the course of the gybes.  Mercifully one had held, preventing the boom flying loose and wrapping itself around the shrouds, doing serious damage.  A jury was rigged and we limped in Jolly Harbour on the west side of Antigua, tying up at 11.30 local time on 14 Dec.
 
Antigua is lovely, and the people are very friendly and helpful.  We've already got the sailmaker on the case, we've had an electrician round to advise on a charging problem, now resolved, and the rigger is coming tomorrow.
 
More in a day or so but the battery on my computer is about to expire.