Harmonie - St. Helena to the Caribbean

St. Helena to the Caribbean - Day 13

Harmonie

Don and Anne Myers

Fri 25 Jan 2013 15:35

01:46.147N 34:28.402W

January 25, 2013

Life at a new tilt.

After several fits and starts throughout yesterday and last night, the northeast wind appears to have won the battle - shoving the weaker, more lovable southeast breeze back down below the equator where it belongs. It's a good thing too because over the past 24 hours, we went through three cycles of engine off - sails up - sail adjustments - sails down - engine on while the northeast wind appeared, turned east, then southeast, then died. Geez, we had forgotten how exhausting it is to sail a boat. The eleven days we spent languishing about while the downwind rig did all the work made us soft.

Thankfully, all that messy wind change stuff seems to be over now as we sail fast (8 knots) on a broad reach in 15-20 knots of steady northeast wind. The doldrums sweaty gray sky is giving way to a more friendly cornflower blue filled with puffy white clouds. This morning, the sunrise came with a nice orange glow instead of the gradations of dull gray the doldrums gave us at dawn the previous two days. It's a whole new world out here, and a whole new tilt. After eleven days of mostly gentle rolling, we are now adjusting to a permanent leftward-lean. With the wind just aft of the starboard beam, Harmonie moves with a few center bounces, followed by a long lurch to port as we sail up and over the northeast swell. Don claims this makes for easier toilet use (the lids stay up much better when the boat leans to port), easier refrigerator spelunking (the door doesn't swing wildly, although it still takes great skill not to allow it to bash into the oven), and easier microwaving (the food and glass plate shouldn't - note the use of the word 'shouldn't' - shoot out of the microwave when on a starboard tack). I say it's a difficult adjustment. Sitting at the helm, which is on the port side, one must lean consistently to starboard to keep upright. Also, all the careful planning associated with foot placement and hand holds for moving safely about the boat while sailing downwind must be completely reconfigured to compensate for the new leftward lean. This is not easy as what was starting to come almost naturally, now must be deliberately thought through before moving around from A to B. The good news is, depending on how long it takes us to sail the remaining 1,720 miles, we have 8 or 9 or 10 days to develop a new system with which to move about the cabin without bashing body parts or critical boat bits.

In other news:

The Namibian butternut squash was totally pissed off when it didn't receive even the slightest honorable mention in the vegetable blog. Its incessant whining forced us to take extreme measures. We ate it. Since then, the onions' blank grayish-black skin has taken on a decidedly accusatory sheen.

For dinner last night, (along with the whiny squash) we had chicken that had gone through at least four freeze/thaw cycles. We are happy to report no ill effects. Tonight, the last of the hamburger will be made into meatloaf. Given the number of meatloaf meals consumed on this voyage, it is predicted meatloaf will be conspicuously absent from our land-lubber dinner fare for the foreseeable future.

Don is onto book seven. Four for me. However, having to actually sail the boat yesterday severely cut into our reading time. We hope to amend this situation as soon as we learn to live with the new tilt.

2,030 miles down, 1,720 miles to go.

Anne