Land Ahoy - Day 18 12/5.2014
Gaviota
Mon 12 May 2014 20:41
|
09:46.668S 138:03.468W
Talk about extremes, after the swimming Genoa
incident the wind started dropping on a daily basis, to keep the boat going
every sail appeared inlcuding the good old Spinnaker, this was effective until
after 2 days the wind almost disappeared, our speed was dropping and all that
gain over the first, fast 10 days was rapidly being lost. We tried a whole
variety of sail configurations, including the Spinnaker poled out but other than rigging up a huge fan at the back the only
option was the engine, so Day 14 the engine went on and we motor sailed for 5
hours to hopefully meet some wind and charge the batteries. Syd was'nt
idle over the 3 no wind days as the generator decided not to start on Day 13, it
had obviously felt ignored and wanted some attention, luckily the problem was
just a wire to terminal fracture and it was sorted quickly and back in
action. Also, the water maker had a first trial at sea and performed
excellently so Syd was in buoyant mood (other than the no wind issue!).
Right on cue the wind decided to start blowing again, we started to race
along - a combination of strong wind and flat seas, but soon the seas
started building. By Day 15 we were in the middle of some very nasty
squalls and most of them contained gusts of up to 25 knots or more, Syd had a
total drenching one night, I managed to time that for his watch! So
by the end of Day 16 we had 2 reefs in the mainsail and a reefed Genoa and were
battling with slowing the boat down, as at times she was careering on at
9-10 knots! Seas were big and nasty. Yesterday the nasty weather seemed to
be moving on and the wind became more predictable again, back to it blowing
direct from behind or on the Port side, so sails constantly changing from Wing
on Wing to Broad Reach.
On the fishing front things have taken a dive, once
the live bait stopped committing suicide on the deck and the only option for
fishing was the collection of lures Syd the fisherman has acquired, he decided
to use his 'piece de resistance' the grossly overpriced cedarwood plug - this
was recommended by 2 'experienced fishermen' in Panama, basically it is a rather
uninteresting looking piece of wood in the shape of a torpedo with a silver
end. Out it went as a last desperate measure - no obvious bites all day
and at sundown we reeled it in and it had vanished! The wire that it was
attached to had been neatly sawn through so a rather large fish had decided it
looked pretty tasty and I would think is now not feeling too great! This
put Syd into a big depression and for 2 days he would not fish, now we have one
line out but no fish - lucky we were'nt relying on feeding ourselves off the
well stocked Ocean during our voyage!
Day 18 dawned and we are 60 miles from land and
very much looking forward to our first sighting later today. As usual we
are due to arrive in the middle of the night but we have decided to go into a
sheltered bay on the next island to Hiva Oa, Tahuata. Reason being our
main casualty is sails, the main reason for the twin Genoas was to avoid too
much stress on the mainsail (which is soon to be another candidate for the
British Museum!). During vigorous reefing several mast sliders have
detached themselves from the mast and the attachment point for reef number 2 on
the sail has pulled off so if we can get the sail down carefully somewhere
sheltered hoepfully some of these bits can be salvaged and we can get the Turin
Shroud back up and give the poor old mainsail a break and hopefully do a better
repair job in Tahiti.
We are both ready for a break and celebratory drink
or 6. Things may be getting to us, Syd has been heard singing 99 Red
Balloons - very worrying and I have reverted to a medley of Proclaimers greatest
hits, including If I could walk 500 miles and I could walk 500 more . . . . . .
. . . . . . . .Oh dear, far too long at sea!!!!!!!
|