Atlantic crossing from Bermuda 12
Thisbe
Wed 13 Jun 2007 17:46
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Tuesday 11th June. On watch
this morning at 8am. A smashing morning, fairly clear sky with
high broken cloud allowing blue to show through. The sea, gunmetal
blue, jumping around a bit in a fresh south westerly, almost dead astern,
truly wonderful tradewind conditions. Its hard to believe that at 14
degrees north, somewhere around 1500 miles to the south of us,
(we are now at 38 degrees north) the wind is blowing the other way.
Imagine a big circle, the wind blowing down the Atlantic coast of Europe,
along the bottom of it towards and along the Caribbean, up
the side to Bermuda, then sweeping back across the Atlantic towards Europe
which is the bit we are enjoying now. We are making great progress
riding this 20 to 25 knot wind and
bigish swell with two headsails, and now have about 730 miles to go. We
expect to arrive at the Azores on Sunday 17th. The forecast just
downloaded, promises weather to remain the same which would be great. Still
being plagued with problems, the generator has failed and we have yet to figure
out why. Also noticed a clunking sound when the propeller is turning,
noticed last night when running the engine to charge the batteries. Michel
(the Pink Panther) is too chicken to go over the side to have a look see,
he is afraid a fish might get him, some action man!( though he did shin up the
mizzen mast unaided this morning to free a halyard) I'd go
over myself but don't want to make the skipper look puny. Trying to
persuade Sue to go but no dice, so far. Slowly catching up with you
guys, now only three hours gmt behind you having put our clock forward
another hour today. Spoke to a big ship on the radio during the night, I
think she was called the Don, they were kind enough to give us a weather
forecast. Not much else to report, only fish to come on deck was a
small squid that came aboard with a
wave.
The language onboard has developed
into a kind of Fronglais which can be hilarious when sitting around not doing
much, however this little tale for the sailors tells a different
story. The two headsails casually mentioned above were hard won. The
plan...... to gybe the main and pole out the Genoa. Easy. Seeing the state
of the state of the mainsail leech forced a change of plan halfway through,
we didn't want to risk the main more than we had to with 1700 miles still to go
to Falmouth. Decided to reef the main, (inmast), and boom out the
stays'l.
On deck, the Pink Panther and myself,
the only two onboard with a clear idea of the plan. Autopilot always goes
on the blink at the wrong moment so Richard at the wheel, Joel
in the cockpit as muscle, hasn't got a clue but very willing, also after two weeks at sea
reckons 'no matelot now, sailorr buoye'. Sue, the quick brown fox, pouring
oil on troubled water, interpreting the gestures and Fronglais
instructions. 50ft boat booming downwind, wind indicator showing 20
plus, forward speed 7 to 8 so probably approaching 30 knots blowing up her skirt
from behind. The pole is quite heavy, in fact raising the pole could be
part of the Royal Tournament, very entertaining. Don't want to bore you
with a lot of tedious detail, suffice to say a lot of shouting to interpret and
a lot of string to unravel, all done without injury to crew or boat. A little
aside, Joel told us about an arrogant colleague in the Gendarmerie, he used to
swagger up to English cars and breathalyse the passenger.
Wednesday morning, favourable wind so
still on a good course, low cloud and pouring rain, the sort of sailing we are
used to. Fairly comfortable so had a very good lunch. Saw two killer whales
passing by at a rate of knots this morning, ignored us completely unlike
the Dolphins, the look at the propeller now postponed indefinitely.
575 miles to the Azores, dry clean clothes and a full English breakfast. Life is
sweet. Manny
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