Happy New Year

Serafina
Rob & Sarah Bell
Sat 1 Jan 2011 13:15

15:04.6N 49:18.9W

 

Thursday 30th and Friday 31st Dec

 

Firstly many thanks to all those of you who have emailed us. It is great to get all your news and i am sorry we have not always answered you all, but typing can be quite tricky with the boat rolling and pitching. My typing is laborious at best, but when you spot the key you want and go to press it, it sort of helps if the same key is there when your finger arrives! The software supplied by that nice Mr Bill Gates struggles to comprehend me sometimes. (Must investigate speech recognition software sometime.)

 

Anyway, thanks to all those who kindly informed me of our exciting destruction of the Australian cricket team. Even had emails from Australians in suicidal despair....

 

So having sailed through the night on a broad reach, we finally reached the rumb line around midday and as it happened S-F was just 2 miles away from us at this point having sailed down the line all night. So just as we came the closest we have been for several days, we were overtaken by a huge black cloud which brought a heavy downpour and 30 knots of wind. Suddenly with nil visibility the two boats were swept along on a new course and we both reflected on the irony if we had now hit each other with so much sea room around us!

 

Once the storm clouds cleared, we set our downwind rig with the twins both poled out. We have taken advice from various experts via email as well as a suggestion from Steve on S-F and the results have been sensational with Serafina now barrelling along downwind without any of the slapping, banging and general commotion suffered earlier.

 

As the sun set we reefed the main and took several turns in the downwind sails so we would slow down and remain behind S-F through the night. The wind continued to blow a steady 15 to 20 knots all night and so we made excellent progress and by dawn were just 100 metres behind S-F. However there had been more than a little excitement during the early hours!

 

Around 5.00am we were sailing about 2.5 miles directly behind S-F with Sarah on watch when she suddenly realised that the light she had assumed was another star disappearing over the horizon might be another boat appearing from the horizon. The radar did show a target, but it was so close to S-F that she assumed briefly that it was just a radar shadow. It turned out to be a yacht sailing upwind in the opposite direction to us, which is just unbelievable as no-one would normally undertake to sail upwind against the trade winds surely?  It was hard to work out what it was doing as its tricolour was definitely the wrong way round and much dimmer than S-F which was beyond the other boat by this time.  The yacht proceeded on port tack to sail straight between us and S-F which caused fluttering hearts on S-F who wondered how they might explain to their insurers how three yachts could collide with the nearest land over 800 miles distant.

 

On Friday morning we closed in on S-F and agreed over the radio that we could photo each other as we passed by. I put out our full downwind sails and quickly accelerated to 8 knots but just as we were about to come level, our Satellite phone began to ring. Sarah was still asleep off watch so I dived down to take the call from Robert F who was very kindly calling with some tech info about our batteries (see below). By the time I came back on deck we were level with S-F and barely 50 metres apart and Steve looked very relieved to see me back at the helm!   In fact, Scott-Free must be feeling a little persecuted as later in the morning we met a tanker rushing in the opposite direction at 14 knots which came within one mile of them!

 

We took loads of shots as we slid past and then we reefed again and let them pass us back to continue on their way. Then as we passed behind them, Sarah popped up with a bottle of ‘Blow Bubbles’ and proceeded to blow loads of soapy bubbles from our rear deck which drifted across the turbulent surface of the sea towards S-F. Not sure any actually reached them, but as a West Ham supporter Steve was suitably impressed by the idea at least. We then put Henry (our Hydrovane windvane self steering system – named after Henry the Navigator) into service which allowed us to turn off the autopilot and save on power. We also launched our tow generator which is a device we tow behind us that gives us several amps of power for free day and night. All in all we have become pretty green.....

 

So to the power problem. We found over the last few days that the battery bank was dying overnight despite the charges we were putting in. Clearly something needed to be done as we were ending the night with systems beginning to fail with warning buzzers etc declaring insufficient voltage.

 

The solution supplied by Robert F has been to investigate the battery banks and see if there is an individual battery which is unwell and disconnect it and its pair from the system as they might be pulling everything down. I managed this despite us being tossed around quite a bit again by a very odd and confused sea and so for now we seem to be OK. Part of the problem is still that we are too power hungry at night and despite the solar panels by day, wind and tow gens, we clearly need to use our generator rather more in the morning and evening to give the batteries a sporting chance!

 

New Year’s Eve was an uneventful night by and large although Sarah did get rained on during one of her watches. We chatted to S-F who were about 6 miles away, at a time we had agreed in advance would be our midnight (we set our own time zones as we cross the Atlantic. In general terms we move the clocks back one hour for every 15 degrees west that we travel. With a bit of luck this will have us arriving in Barbados in the same time zone as them which is UT minus 4.) and exchanged best wishes. They invited us over for a drink, but we declined as we were a bit tired.....