Greetings!
Happy Canada Day from this side of the Dateline :)
Benjamin and I passed the time this morning while we were motoring through another calm playing cards in the cockpit. This is much more in my comfort zone than chasing monsters and bad guys around the saloon! This sea-state is so extraordinary - the sea is flat as far as the eye can see, and the bright blue is the same colour as our hull. There is hardly a cloud in the sky.
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| The last flight ... |
By late morning, there was no denying that the wind had built to about 8 kts, so it was time for the mom/kid team hoisted the spinnaker. This is noteworthy only because of its rarity: it is usually 'Max's turn' to do most foredeck evolutions, and it has been easy for me to 'lean out' and leave him to it. Because he was off-watch, and because there was no particularly good reason for it to not be 'my turn', we just got ourselves organized and did it. I was quite proud!
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| Spinnaker trimming. |
Ever since our close encounter with a sperm whale the other day, we have been keeping our eyes especially peeled. Most of our sightings are of random pieces of plastic floating by, but Max's vigilance was rewarded this afternoon. While we made our way slowly downwind under spinnaker, he heard a whale blow near the boat but just behind us; he then had a few sightings at a distance, as well as a whale who surprised him by diving a few boat lengths away from our bow.
By the late afternoon, the spinnaker had been doused, gybed, and hoisted again, and it was beautiful against the bright blue sky when I came back to the cockpit after my off-watch. All the kids were below, and Max and I had a rare quiet visit just enjoying its contribution to our passage and thinking back with fondness to the handful of other times when the winds have actually been light enough, and the seas flat enough, to use it. We have had very little time since we left home when the sailing didn't feel like 'hard work', and this has actually been quite an enjoyable hiatus of light winds and calm seas. All too soon, it was time to go downstairs to cook dinner.
I had hardly started when the call came to come back upstairs - our beloved spinnaker had suffered a massive two-way tear down and across the main panel. We had no choice but to bundle it into its bag and go back to flying the genoa. If necessary, we will move the sock to our back-up spinnaker (which came with the boat and is about 37 years old) tomorrow morning, and see what can be made of this spinnaker when we make landfall. My guess is that the fabric just weakened and deteriorated with UV and age. We have found ourselves marvelling at its perfect timing, as we think we are coming to the end of the calms :)
As Max put it, it was a 'tearible' day for our spinnaker...
Terrible day or not, we decided to celebrate Canada Day with a 'BBQ'. During my off-watch in the afternoon, Victoria decorated the cake that she and Benjamin had baked yesterday and made hamburger buns (as well as a loaf of bread that was pretty much demolished by the time I woke up). We elected to cook our burgers in a pan as mounting the BBQ on the side rail was just a little too much excitement with the spinnaker flying (and by the time it was not flying it was too close to sunset and some of our festive spirit had been doused as well). I have to admit that the burger fixings were a little sparse, but we did have a heap of sprouts on each one as a nod to greenery. After carrying them around for seven years, the kids broke into our stash of temporary tattoos, and were appropriately decorated for the festivities. I love that being on passage focuses our attention on the small details that make celebrations special, without the need for an excess of either effort or 'stuff'. Everything that happens has to fit into the watch routine and the short overlaps when the whole family is awake.
We decided against having a fireworks display :)
Once dinner was over, it was time for the night watch. We had quite an elaborate set up for the genoa and main that needed to be dealt with then the wind dropped: this time it was the Johnathan/Mom team on duty. When we run deep downwind we use a 'running sheet' on our genoa rather than its usual sheet. This lets us fly the sail a little more outboard than the usual sheet will allow, as twists off less (better sail shape) and would otherwise chafe the lifelines. The running sheet comes down to a turning point on the toe rail and then through the life-line netting to the winch that we usually use to furl the genoa, so Johnathan and I had to do all the changes in steps. We took the load back on the normal sheet, sheeted the genoa in tightly so that we could reach the running sheet, and then Johnathan clipped in on the side deck to remove the running sheet and the turning point (block) from the toe rail without losing either himself or the expensive gear over the side. Once the running sheet was off the winch, we used it to furl the genoa with the usual setup. We then turned our attention to the main, which had a 'preventer' in place. The preventer is a line that runs from the far end of the boom to a strong padeye and back to the cockpit that prevents the boom from accidentally gybing. It also keeps the boom steady (and therefore quiet) in lumpier seas. We needed to take the tension off the preventer, sheet in the main so that Johnathan could reach the attachment point between the main preventer line and the 'tail' of dyneema that comes from the far end of the boom, and hook the tail onto the stowage point on the boom itself. Once again, it has been disproportionately Max's turn to do these evolutions, and I was pleased that Johnathan and I were able to deal with the sails as a duo. I was even more pleased when I reversed the process by myself a few hours later when the wind came up and it was time to motor. Everything can be done if it is done carefully and slowly, with forethought and clipping in :) (These maneuvers don't make it into these 'letters home' when Max does them because he does sail changes so often while he is alone on watch that they stop being noteworthy. Also, each of us will wake the other if we need to do a two-person evolution mid-watch!)
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| You can see the running sheet taken to a block on the toerail and the preventor running forward to a pad eye forward. |
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| Our boom preventor is in two parts. One is a 1/2" dacron line that goes from a winch in the cockpit forward to a padeye and back close to the cockpit where it can be attached to the 1/4" Dynemea line that resides under the boom when it is not being used. The other end of the dynmea line is spliced onto the aft end of the boom |
As our friends and family at home move from winter to summer, we are slowly moving into colder water and warmer layers. Our sea temperature that was over 29 deg C when we left Rongerik has been pretty steady at 28 deg for most of the trip, and in the last day has dropped to about 25 deg C. We don't notice the cooler temperatures much in the day time (although the cases of heat rash seem to be subsiding) but I am aware of the change during the night watch. My light Woolx sweater has now been augmented by a fleece and I have switched to wool leggings from yoga capris. The big change is that after a few nights of cold feet I have actually dug out my wool socks! Of course, I tell you all this to give you a bit of a chuckle, as mid-20s weather at home in Halifax would hardly be cause to break out the thermals :) (Max just shakes his head when he comes on watch in t-shirts, shorts, and bare feet). I am sure that I will slowly acclimatize as our distance from the tropical latitudes grows, and that my Canadian blood will thicken again before long!
Love and Happy Canada Day to all,
Elizabeth
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At 2019-07-01 3:29 AM (utc) SV Fluenta's position was 33°51.51'N 166°50.80'E
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