I'm sitting alone in the cockpit, taking the 6 to 9 “dawn” watch. I relieved Neil just an hour ago, and turned on the engine to charge the batteries, they were down to minus 81, when they get to minus 100 they are too flat to run the autohelm. The reason they are so low is the towed generator has been down since last night.
I've just squeezed a few more degrees west, currently we're averaging six knots on 204 degrees. Our best course is 212 degrees, but that has us sailing too close to the gybe.
It's still dark, I'm using the head torch to see what I'm writing, which doesn't do much for my night vision, but there is nothing but sea for miles.
The stars are gradually disappearing from the sky, caused by a combination of the approaching dawn and a light haze forming. The moon is just below half, it hadn't risen before my last watch finished at midnight.
We finally got away from Las Palmas on Thursday, filled up with diesel and left the fuel pontoon at 14:30. A few French boats, including Stefan and Didier, left just before us. Paul and Maura from Noble Warrior waved us off from the pontoon.
We deployed the towed generator, seems to be only giving about half the power I was expecting, or about half an amp per knot of speed. The fact that its propellor is trailing on thirty metres of rope is a bit of a worry, I hope it doesn't wrap around anything.
I considered putting a reef in about sunset Thursday, but decided it wasn't worth the effort. I regretted it later as the wind got up to over twenty knots and we were whizzing along at eight knots. So last night just before the sun set we made the effort. Neil suggested heaving to while we reefed, I remembered Catherine and I got ourselves into a bit of a mess when we tried that before, however I wanted to see if there was a better way and if Neil would do anything differently. We were also due to gybe, so it seemed to make sense to combine the two manoeuvres.
We had quite a bit of speed on bouncing along in a moderate sea, I crawled onto the foredeck on my hands and knees to rearrange the gybe preventer line. All went well until the sheet caught in the jackstay, and we had to depower the genoa and I had to crawl forward a second time to release. By the time we had that sorted I realised in all the fuss I had dropped the preventer line, which was now trailing in the sea off the end of the boom. Another struggle to retrieve the line, and then I had to crawl to the bow a third time to lead the line through the fairlead and back to the cockpit.
Finally back in the cockpit Neil spotted that the generator had stopped turning. Seeing that I was knackered he went back himself to see what was wrong. It turned out gybing the long way round to heave to in the process wasn't such a good idea, considering that I didn't stop to think the effect this would have on the thirty metre rope we were trailing from the generator, and which was now wrapped around the rudder.
Hot, tired, and sweaty, the last of our daylight disappearing with the imminently setting sun, and a rope around our rudder, all I could think to say was a swear word, and only one at that, but I repeated it multiple times. Fortunately Neil was a bit more positive in his thinking, saying reassuringly from his vantage point at the back of the boat that it was alright, he could fix it.
I confess I was a bit circumspect of youthful optimism, but I nodded to him to have a go, as the alternative plan forming in my mind involved launching the dinghy & trying to poke out the rope from it, and in the fading light this was going to be a lot of grunt work. Thankfully my circumspection was misplaced, and in a few minutes Neil had the rope free. I had sufficiently recovered to go back and help haul in the rope.
We had started all this to put in a reef before dark, but by now the sun had long set, with the very last traces of daylight in the sky. I decided that redeploying the towed generator would best be left until the morning. Hence, when I started my watch ten hours later, the batteries were low, and hence we are now running the engine to put a charge back in them.
In the process the jackstay, which is what we clip our lifelines onto when going on deck, came under such force when it was caught in the genoa sheet that I no longer trust it, and it'll be replaced at the next chandlers. Other than that, we lost a boathook overboard in the excitement, but considering the damage we might have had to the generator or the rudder, this was small price to pay.
While I have been writing it has become daylight, it takes less than thirty minutes at these latitudes, and the haze I referred to earlier is making for a somewhat grey dawn with no sign of the sun yet. It'll show soon enough and we'll be back to blue skies.
The “Mother – Daughter – Son” watches are working with mixed success so far. We started on Thursday with Catherine as mother, me as daughter, and Neil as son. So Catherine roasted the chicken, but all I did was the wash up, and the son role is probably a little il-defined. Yesterday Neil produced a fine dinner of sweet and sour left over chicken, albeit with a bit of coaching and assistance from Catherine.
So far Neil is the only one with a full appetite, Catherine and I are still feeling a bit quesy in the swell. Oddly I was fine on Thursday, and only began to feel iffy yesterday. Today being the third day I am expecting we'll both improve.
The boat is stuffed to the gils with provisions. We've been buying bottled water to drink, especially in the Canaries, where the tap water is all desalinated and has a bit of a taste. However, generally we don't drink the water from the boat's tank, except in tea and coffee. We left Las Palmas with our 500 litre water tanks full, plus an emergency 80 litres of tap water, plus almost 200 litres of bottled drinking water. On top of this we have about 80 litres of beer, ten of UHT milk, three litres of skipper's whiskey, two litres of brandy, plus the bottles of Port, Madeira, vodka and wine that we have picked up in our travels. Although, comparatively, we have very little wine. Catherine, when doing the final shop was, I think, less concerned about Aragorn's waterline than the one in our bank account!
Ahh, finally, I see the sun, a hazy yellow disk off the port beam (left of the boat to the non-mariner). Well, ok for 08:25. Just over half an hour of my watch left. Catherine will be up to relieve me soon. It went fast enough while I was writing. When she comes up I'll have a go at redeploying the towed generator. We have a rule on board, no one goes on deck without someone in the cockpit to take appropriate action in the event of anything going askew.
Before we left home a friend of Catherine's bought her a little brass sign that reads “My husband is Captain, but I have been made Admiral”. I promptly put it up in the boat with enthusiasm, in the galley! It's my turn to be mother today, but no less than Neil, I'll be under the strict supervision of the admirtal of the galley.
Hasta Luego!
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