DAY 1 - heading out!

Ugcxatlantic
Fri 21 Nov 2008 11:30
27:46.90N 15:42.60W
Puerto Rico, Friday, 10 am
Starting coordinates have been fed into this Diary log and we are ready to
leave from Puerto Rico in the next hour. Been two busy days to complete the
final preparations, including organizing all provisions required for up to 25
days in sea and drinking water for further more 5 days (for safety).
The last crew member Helena, arrived last midnight so we are now complete
team
Last minutes preparations included, besides of the logistics, scrubbing and
cleaning the yacht inside/outside, climbing the mast-top for inspection of
sail hoist and furling - the salt water during last months in sea had led
to more difficult reefing of the furling main sail, some spray of WD-40 oil
do good. The yacht took quite a lot of beating on its journey down from
Sardinia via Gibraltar, digging the bow deep into the waves, and we have
been concerned about some small saline water leakage around the inlet pipes
for the watermaker, which in consequence may badly influence the electric
systems and put the watermaker out of function. The watermaker is crucial for
comfort on board. However, with Sikaflex acrylics available from Sika it
could be fixed, we hope it's resolved permanent....
So in the final step, by mistake, we filled 400 ltr water from the
marina services into our water tanks but we learned only later that it is
NOT drinking water quality, - so we decide to pump the whole lot
out again into the sea, but the we experience the waterpump
breaks down. No good. Fortunately, the local mechanic in town brought us
(as he promised!) last night a new replacement, of course against a few hundred
Euroes.
The logistic prior to departure, and later onboard, is a challenging
task itself. All our provisions for 5 persons for up to 4 weeks must be
safely stored away, no breaking eggs in rough sea. Come back to this later,
maybe...
All for now, weather is nice, ~22 degrees, a low breeze we expect (or
rather hope) to find once we get out in open sea but first we must tank 500 ltr
diesel on our way out of the harbor marina... We will most likely use
lots of it the first 2-3 days until we reach further south, heading for the
north-east trade wind. Introduction of the crew later, but you have perhaps by
now already guessed that we are 4 well grown-up boys and 1 lady onboard !
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