Atlantic Crossing Day 16  - Tuesday  14^th March 2023

Before I start today’s blog, we’ve been told that Saturday’s blog (Day 13) didn’t arrive. Mmm, strange as we uploaded it in the normal way. For anyone being OCD about it, I’ve pasted that blog below this one. These blogs form our own ‘diary’ records for the future too.

Last night was a rollercoaster of a ride. Seas from nearly all directions. Stargazer getting knocked for six and the mate and I not feeling very happy about any of it. All that said, we stood our watches as normal and as the morning came, things eased a little. The hot sun always makes things seem better. Our distance run in the last 24 hours wasn’t great at 135NM, but that’s mainly because we had to reduce sail before dark and as there were no volunteers for foredeck work (me included) to go and drop the number 4, we had no choice but to roll away the genoa, gybe over the number 4 and run with it all night on the leeward (port) side. It was OK, but we were a bit underpowered and hence a bit slower overnight. Also, sometimes you need a bit of sail up to punch on through the seas when they are being a bit troublesome. We’ve just been discussing tonight’s tactics and when we’ve got the grib, we may end up doing the same tonight.

Our distance to go to Rodney Bay is now some 370NM, so we can look forward to a Friday morning arrival. Meaning we don’t need big speed as such, because we’d rather arrive in daylight. So three more nights at sea for us. The only tricky aspect of this is that we had to head a bit south to get breeze from when we were becalmed and we now need to get a few north miles in to be on the right course for Rodney Bay. Our trouble with this is that the beam on seas from the north are ‘punishing’ and trying to get any northing at the moment is simply not possible. Hopefully as we get closer to the Lesser Antilles the wind will veer more to the east and allow us to claw our way back up to the line we need.

The mate did a great job last night with charging batteries and making water, mechanical things have eluded the mate in the past, but I think solid progress is being made…

We’ve just altered the ship’s clocks to GMT-3 so we have an extra hour before watches start today. This is a good thing, as being double handed, time in the day when we are both up is short and even though we’ve been at this passage for over two weeks, we do  still like to see each other  J

I’ll post a better update tomorrow on likely arrival at Rodney Bay…

The mate has a p.s. on the sea state - Last night was rather like being in a cauldron – messy, confused and uncomfortable. Not that I know exactly what it is like to be in a cauldron but I imagine similar! When Skip woke me at 0200 for my second night watch he said “This is going to be a long 400 miles!”. Having my fake Special K brekkers in the cockpit was reminiscent of the Jim’ll Fix It episode where the scouts wanted to eat their jam doughnuts on the Revolution roller coaster in Blackpool. To complete the picture my current backup lip balm has a ‘cherry shine’ so when applied on a boat in a cauldron I look like I have had an Airplane moment or like Robert Smith from the Cure! At least it makes Skip chuckle.

Galley supplies are depleted somewhat but for tonight’s dins (being cooked to perfection in the Wonderbag) we have a medley of vegetables in a piquant tomato sauce served over a bed of creamy mashed potato (read: random tinned veg in tomato passata with a shake of cayenne!). I haven’t decided what my first meal ashore will be but am enjoying thinking about it…

Saturday’s Post – Day 13

Atlantic Crossing Day 13  - Saturday  11^th March 2023   Position 14:06.5N 048:12.2W

Apologies for the cut and paste typo on yesterday’s blog. It was of course Day 12 and Friday – oops…

So back to today, which is correctly Day 13 and Saturday. Last night was pretty uneventful (which can be a good thing at sea) except some wind built from the NE which was good. We were able to sail under genoa most of the night, doing around 4.8kn. The Sargasso is still too dense to deploy the duogen so we had to resort to a couple of engine hours to charge the batteries and make some water this morning.  The water maker continues to make great water, although it has now sadly started leaking , albeit ever so slightly, from its pump back plate. From memory this is the one seal I didn’t have when we rebuilt it, luckily I don’t regard it as serious and I’ll sort it out in St Lucia. For now, water production is excellent and we’re pleased.

Today we have some breeze! 18 knots of it and from the NE (the right direction). I arrived on deck at 0930 and the mate was already there. The waves looked a little challenging in terms of their short period and with the constant beam on swell from the north. Checking the gribs, the wind looked set for the day and so the number 4 had to go up on the pole to windward with the genoa out to leeward. This was our original rig on leaving Cape Verde and it’s a good one – the only trouble was the hassle of re-rigging it all after all the becalmed days and the spinnaker of yesterday. So, clipping on, I ventured to the foredeck to get all the lines sorted out etc etc, aided and abetted by comments from the mate, such “be careful” “look out” “big wave” and suchlike. (It’s actually OK up on the foredeck, it’s getting here and back that’s the problem). All done and with the twin headsails up Stargazer was flying and very balanced, speeds of up to 7.8kn were clocked in the gusts and so it has been all day. The only trouble has been the confused seas we’re experiencing; most of the time it’s fine, but every now and then a big wave from the stern quarter coincides with a big swell from the beam and bingo, you get a bit knocked for six!

John K iridium messaged us last night as he hadn’t heard from us for a couple of days and was just checking that all was well on Stargazer. We still can’t believe our luck meeting John in Cape Verde, to have one of the most famous cruising sailors in the world looking out for you is something we are so grateful for. John’s boat is still stuck in Cape Verde waiting new mast and rigging, so all we can do is wish him the best and hope that he gets away in May.

Stargazer is handling everything very well and given good wind and a decent sea state, we are back in business and now heading directly for St Lucia – as we had to come south for wind our passage distance has increased, but it was worth it rather than bobbing around for another day further north.

The mate is tired today (well we both are, but she’s more tired than me) so I’m encouraging her to get some sleep. This is her first ocean crossing and neither of us were expecting it to be taking quite as long as it looks like it will. Still, being becalmed was pretty OK actually, it was nice to see the Atlantic at its most peaceful.

The kite, yesterday, probably put about 20NM onto our distance run, which was a little better at 115NM. Let’s hope for a good days run report tomorrow – it’s looking good!