There are somethings you can only learn in a storm !

Sorry, I have taken till now to give some details about my experiences during my race qualifier passage. I have been a little busy, -but thats no excuse.

I left A Coruna with style and purpose, sailing with a 15knt breeze on my beam. Beautiful sunny day and the boat was performing well. I was very humbled leaving the Torre de Hecules, the oldest Roman lifghthouse still in operation. First task was to cross busy shipping lanes only a few miles off the coast. I plotted a course 90 degrees to the commercial shipping lanes and watched for possible collision courses with variious ships….like 20 of them throughout the crossing. Of course, being a sailboat, I enjoyed the ‘right of way’ for encounters. As long as I was holding my course steady, I should have no need to avoid any ships as they would give way. I did, and they all did. :-)

Soon, night fell and started to think about some sleep as I had been up for while and knew I would be up later in the evening. No sleep for the determined ! I did manage a couple of hours, Upon waking I did notice the wind had strengthened and I was planning to reduce sail as my overall plan was to ‘baby’ the boat on my 2000 mile voyage. Why? Because the boat had finished the Globe40 race only a few months earlier(placing 1st with Owner Frans Budel and Ysbrand Endt) and had received no maintenence since. Since I had no reason to go fast, its a qualifier not a race, I planned to not overtax anything. This was more a pleasure cruise sort of trip.

Once I saw sustained gusts of 23knts I chose to take in sail. Staysail was furled and my speed dropped a few knots and the boats motion was easier, and heeling less.

With no ships appearing on the AIS (transponder blips to show ships heading course and name and speed) It was time again to catch an hour of sleep. Before that though I checked the weather and was happy the winds would be fine, not to strong, not too light. Very pleasant sleep.

Next couple of days were the same, except slowly the winds changed direction, and they lightened quite a bit. Weather showed the wind would eventually strengthen to 25knts.

Now the fun part….

Somewhere along the way I subsequently learned I was not using the navigational software correctly. Oops.

Adrena software is awesome and very powerful for course plotting with wind data loaded in. I download weather, load it into Adrena and then ask it to plot a course for me. It crunches the data and spits out the optimum course for my boat and the given wind over the next period of time.

However, I didnt see the forecasted winds resetting to an earlier time period. Reason was I was already getting a bit tired and wasnt thinking things through properly. Lesson soon to be learned. I was looking at weather now…not in 6hrs,12hrs so my course was not adjusted, and I had no idea the wind was going to just rise and rise. Instead I had the wind dropping and dropping more steadily. Soon it was flat calm no wind and I was now using the motor scooting along at 8knts. The sunset was beautiful, reflecting off the mirror like ocean. Alarm bells should have gone off in my head with unique weather and conditions. But I was distracted by the view and ….a bird.

At around 10pm, with the sun setting a while back, I was planning for the night. Boat was dark and I had red lights on at the chart table. Then PHOOM ! flap flap flap… a bird flys into the cabin, does two circuits and flies back out ! Scared the heck out of me. I thought I was very alone til that point thus the fright. After he left I was sad, birds that far offshore are doomed in most cases. Migrating birds can get tired and with no place to land, they can suffer a hopeless fate. But not this fellow ! He came zooming back in and perched on the hand ropes up forward.

Suddenly I wasn’t alone ! I had a friend. My sadness became happiness with someone to talk to. He changed positions a few times and I worried about him releaving himself on valuable things rather than on the cabin deck say… which due to the boats motion through the waves he soon realized was the calmer spot onboard.

He nestled himself in between my Musto boots and immediately got some sleep. I put water and bits of biscuit near him in case he decided to eat. Then I did the same, and got two hours sleep. When I awoke, he had flown off and I was a bit sad because he would need to go 250+ miles to spain, or 200 miles to the Azores Islands. Good Luck little buddy.

Little did I know he was probably thinking the same thing. Hehe. Why? cause he knew the storm was out there.

I awoke and was surprised the wind had picked up again and now was over 25knts ..funny I didnt see it on Adrena. Pfft. The wind continued to strengthen and I was getting a bit worried that my easy sail was turning into some work. I furled the staysail again and hearing Josh talking telepathically to me, took 2 reefs in the mainsail. Then an hour or two later, with the wind rises still, I took in the jib. I was getting a bit nervous that the wind wasnt as planned.. as far I could see on Adrena. Now the gusts were over 30knts which wasnt anything to take lightly. But, inspte of it all the boat was ‘in control’ , autopilot was handling the boats motion under main only. Getting tired is worse than most crisises on board while offshore sailing. So again I took the opportunity to catch an hour and a half sleep. But given the wind rising I decided the best thing was to drop the main and head downwind more before lying down.

I awoke after only an hour …to the sound of complete mayhem from on deck. Sails were flapping very loudly. How could that be? I launched out of my berth dressed in jeans and a T shirt and ran on deck. 4secs later I was soaked head to toe. I look forward and both headsails are locked together ..partially unfurled and currently flogging themselves to death. Oops. no one else to blame when solo sailing hehe. I made three attempts to sort the sails, but to no avail. The top of the sails had come unfurled, sheets had loosened and wrapping into gordians knot the size of a football. I could see sail damage had occured already, and i tried to tighten up the furl but no joy, there was something jammed up. So, I needed a break and regroup. Went down below and put on some wey gear and donned some ‘armor’ to battle the dragon on the bow. helmet and safety harness gave me confidence to go up to the foredeck and see if I could sort it out.

Surreal moment came as I was inspecting the jib’s furling system. Thats when the bow went down and a wave 3 feet taller than the bow crashed over me. I experienced a moment of clarity. hehe. So thats what its like. Like standing under a waterfall for 3 secs. I stayed put ..but I was soaked yet again. Living the dream.

After was not too noteworthy, I failed in every attempt. Damage was done and nothing would save the sails, but otherwise boat was fine.

The new plan was to run downwind and keep the sails from damaging anything else..like the mast. So instead of going around the Azores, I was forced to stop. I spent a week in paradise .. great vacation spot IMO. Met people who were great, who I never should have met.

so all in all, a great learning experience. The NKE instruments recorded 58knts over the deck at its peak. Thats almost normal at times in the southern ocean. Ill be there for months. You can’t buy experience like that at any sailing school course.

so I have that going for me. ;-)

Phoenix 44 out.