15:55:457S 5:43:418W St Helena

Shaya Moya
Don & Susan Smyth
Thu 29 Jan 2015 15:28
The 1600nm from Cape Town to St Helena in the South Atlantic Ocean has been the slowest yet. Light winds to no wind beset the voyage and we motored a third of the distance, some 533nm. Our fuel consumption after the service and repairs done in Cape Town has improved remarkably and we are getting around 6-7 litres per hour. The fishing has been very poor with only a couple of under sized tuna and nothing else. Even the birdlife has been negligeable.
 
 
With such light wind and the Ocean swell the boat was rolling quite a bit. Even if one is used to it, the motion is uncomfortable. We decided to gybe from port to starboard tack to try and get a better course to St Helena on one such quiet day when things went pear shaped. As we loosened the gybe preventer to swing the boom around, a larger than normal swell hit us, rocking the boat side to side. The untethered boom swung from the one side all the way to the other and with a shuddering crash, broke loose from the mainsheet travellor. In laymen terms we lost control of the boom which swung across the boat, breaking loose from where it is tethered to the block that controls it. Disaster of course, but no new expearience for Shaya Moya. The same thing happened to Reece and I on our leg from Tonga to New Zealand. We quickly used the gybe preventer lines to secure the boom midships and then rigged a bridle to hold the boom to the now broken car. Lesson learned.
 
 
After 11,5 days we finally arrived at Jamestown, St Helena's only town. The wharf has the rather quaint way of landing on the island by hauling one self ashore using ropes hung from a derick. This is the only way ashore, even from the occasional cruise liners and the mailship. Goods are ferried via barge from the ship, anchored offshore , to the wharf where they are lifted ashore by crane. We spent the three days there using the local ferry taxi service for £1 per trip.
 
 
 
The town itself is built in a narrow valley running from the shore up to a dead end. When they ran out of space in the valley they built on top of the southern hill. This is connected with the famous Jacobs Ladder, some 699 steps. Yes Ted, Tom and I climbed it one evening. Ant declined saying having climbed it once before 36 years ago he had the t-shirt. I now know why.
 
 
St Helena was on the route from Europe to the East and prospered until the Suez canal was opened in 1869. Since then it has been supported by the British who have governed the island for over 300 years. It has a population of only 5500 people and is still struggling to be self supporting. Cash crops like the wholesale planting of flax for making ropes was destroyed with the invention of nylon.
 
 
The Island is where Napolean was exiled to in 1815, after being defeated in the battle of Waterloo. He died on the island in 1821. We did an island tour and visited Longwood House that was built for him, as well as his original tomb. He is no longer buried there. His body was taken back to France in 1840. Another little known history of the island is that the British held over 6000 Boer prisoner of war in a concentration camp on the island.
 
Jamestown has a couple of supermarkets with limited produce, imported mainly from South Africa. The RMS St Helena mailship brings this to the island every 6 weeks. There is a lot of speculation on whether this service will be reduced once the £400 million airport is completed. There are a handful of restuarants.
 
 
 
 
 
We visited one of the local pubs and met quite a few characters. Ant was in his element showing his brochure of the island to the locals and regailing them with his visit there in 1978. We met up with the Editor and owner of the Independant newspaper, Mike Olsen and his wife Bernice, a local Councillor who gave us an interesting insite to life on the island. It seems that although dependant on the welfare from Britain, there is not a lot of love for their Governship.
 
 
A highlight of the stop here must be the wonderful experience of snorkelling with a 10m whale shark. These docile plankton eating mammals are inquisitive and he stayed near the surface for ages, allowing us the opportunity of getting some amazing photos.
 
 
All too soon, after three days on the island we were on our way again to Salvador, Brazil, some 1900nm away across the Southern Atlantic. The fleet has split up here, with some going to Ascension island and then on to the Arc de Fernando de Noronho islands off the North East coast of Brazil, missing the carnival in Salvador. We had contemplated doing something similar as us oldies are somewhat past carnival age, however Joel from the ARC team is kindly bringing the spare car with him to Salvador, much to young Tom's delight.