OSTAR Day 3
Day 3
Thursday 30th May 12.00 BST
Position – 49 01 51 N 13 12 81 W
Log 418 miles (141 over last 24 hours)
The gales of the last 36 hours have finally passed through. It is a beautiful sunny day. I had a good night with plenty of sleep and I feel great. I have unfurled the jib to its maximum and have shaken out 2 of the reefs in the main. The wind speed is around 15-17kn and I am still not sailing to close but keeping at 40° AWA. There is still a fair swell running, but it is much softer and not as angry as it has been now I am a good distance off the continental shelf. The boat is going well with speeds between 6.2 and 6.7kn.
Last evening I had a few snags – I have been drawing a lot of power running Arnold through the last couple of days and needed a good charge as my batteries were showing below 60% and drawing 4.5amps. I started the engine and after a couple of minutes they stopped charging! Wow – disaster – I have a long way to go and not much power left. I switched everything off that I could, but Arnold was still nailing the amps. Time to have a think about plan B. I have the monitor windvane for steering, so that should not be a problem and I could hand steer for a good amount of the time when the weather is not so bad. I got out my two back up handheld GPS, checked they were all working ok and put in some waypoints – found the N Atlantic passage chart and put some dots on. I have everything needed to do it the old fashioned way - it will not be as easy as it would be with all the boat electronics working, but I have the means to carry on. At around 21.30 I gave David Llewellyn a call to see if he could help me check if there was something I could do and after going through a few checks, we found a way around the charging issue and I am pleased to say all looks ok for now. If anyone in Portscatho who is reading this sees David, please relay my thanks to him.
I need to get out on the foredeck at some stage and make a few running repairs to my jib furling system which is chaffing badly and needs to be sorted, but I am waiting for the wind to die a bit more as is forecast in the next 12 hours or so
Boris is looking much better today and we have had a good chat this morning about weather routing – We have decided to stay to the North as the wind shows no signs of moving out of the NW for the next few days – so my course is set for the edge of the Grand Banks for the time being……….
Thanks to those who have sent emails to britishbeagle {CHANGE TO AT} mailasail {DOT} com – please note that I am getting them but will not reply as it takes too long on the iridium connection – but they are all much appreciated.
I understand that I have clawed my way back to 2nd in class with the lead boat some 25 miles in front of me. He rates 0.952 against my 0.934 so he has to give me a bit of time so if I can hold on to him and not let him get too far ahead………who knows. If I hadn’t given the fleet 35 miles on day one with my cock-up, I would actually be ahead of him.
All good aboard the Hound. She may be a bit old and a bit scruffy round the edges, leaks like a tea strainer - but I love this boat.
Back tomorrow