The 2nd leg passage from Cape Verde to St Lucia was quite different from the passage down to the Cape Verde. After strong winds just after the start in the acceleration zone between the islands of Sao Vicente and San Antao it settled down to a NE wind virtually the whole way. We had a period of almost 4 hrs on the first night where we seemed to fall into a hole with mountainous seas and no wind from all over the place- it brought to mind something out of Greek mythology Charybidis maybe – as Poseidon vented his fury on us, but we eventually managed to escape and make progress. We could see from the AIS that this happened to other boats too while others creamed by unscathed quite close by. Some minor squalls meant we had to reef, there was another night with frustrating holes and calms, otherwise we were lucky to have a good wind most of the way. Mostly we sailed with poled out Yankee and main with preventer. Not the most efficient rig for our cutter as the forward lowers mean the pole can’t go out square so you can’t even deploy the whole Yankee and the aft lowers mean you can’t let the main out far enough. We really should have set twin headsails but not having practised the manoeuvre were reluctant to commit ourselves. Our main problem was not being able to sail far enough down wind, with fluctuations in wind strength the wind vane steering had to be set for about 150 to 120 deg, so our course zig zags along the rhumb line as we gybed. We did try setting the cruising chute (with refurbished snuffer) a couple of times but this was not v successful, if you had it powered up enough to drive through the swell it was only just on the edge of control. Then it got wrapped round the fore stay and took an hour to unravel!

Did we roll – yes of course, downwind in a big swell you will roll whatever sails you set, but actually not as bad as expected . It is though a bit frustrating when everything in the galley had gone flying yet again as the boat made an unexpected lurch. What did we do before the dead frog stuff was invented? Occasionally a cross swell would slap the quarter and cascade into the cockpit soaking anyone at the helm if any one was there (though this can happen in the Kyles of Bute) and maybe going through the pilot cabin window open to the cockpit and giving the off watch crew a rude awakening. However we managed to cook and bake bread and even some cookies the whole way. The fresh food just about lasted, though we only had onions and limes left. We ate some lentils, but very few tins.

COMMUNICATIONS
The other difference to the first leg was that the fleet spread out really quickly! By the first morning everyone was out of sight and almost out of VHF range too. On the way to Cape Verde we got some freak VHF reception so we could speak over much longer distances than should have been possible. However our SSB installed the year before but almost completely untried seemed to work fine, so Steve had volunteered to be a net controller for this leg and faithfully took part in the twice daily schedule. They all had a lot of fun with it. Steve set up a Nautical Trivia quiz for the other boats via SSB which folk seemed to enjoy. What we didn’t realise until later was that apart from the boats that came up on the SSB schedule, there were others listening in to the chat and everything who had receive only sets. We did also use the SSB to send and receive emails to Rally control and to download weather grib files. The Sat phone was kept in reserve, we received a few texts and good wishes from friends and tried to send to another’s boat.

NAVIGATION
Steve also tried to take some sun sights with the sextant. Occasionally our noon latitude from the sextant was only 10 miles out. All a bit of an anachronism when you have your position by GPS of course.

EQUIPMENT
It was a shame that the brand new Raymarine speed/log instrument stopped working as we left Mindelo. To judge distance we were just counting down the miles to the waypoint at the North end of St Lucia from the GPS. This does lend itself to various celebrations – 1000 miles to go, 500, 250 100 etc.

The other equipment not working was the diesel generator and of course the watermaker as it needed 240V. In the end we had enough battery charging from the wind vane and the towed charger, both working really well, so we did not have to start the engine at all. Though we were fairly economical with power usage, turning off anything non essential (echosounder, chart plotter screen). Occasionally when we were going fast and had too much power I turned up the fridge. Of course the towed charger was slowing us down a little but as we used it the whole way we didn’t really notice. We did find though that it was best to slow right down to deploy it or the line got so many kinks – this meant taking in all sail as we made 2-3 knots under bare poles, and you also had to slow down to get it in. We were careful with the water usage especially as we have no working gauge on the tanks. We used seawater for rinsing and a little in cooking. In the end we had only used part of one of the 2 tanks and there was also all the emergency water in cans and bottles. It was a shame we couldn’t use the watermaker as with it I felt we could have sailed on forever not limited by time if we could replenish the tank very few days.

Most of the other kit seemed to work Ok. We were very pleased with the Hydrovane self steering. The Bimini made by Owen sails of Oban is very good, Steve especially needs the shade.

Other boats were not so fortunate. At least 3 had rudder problems, 2 had broken fore stays (luckily the masts stayed up), and a couple had jammed or broken headsail furling gear.

RUBBISH
We got rid of as much packaging as possible before we set off, of course. Food waste was collected in a pot, chopped up small and thrown overboard. Tins etc were washed out in seawater and squashed and stored, there were not many bottles being a dry ship. Other stuff was carefully washed in seawater and cut up small, so when we got to St Lucia we had one small bag which didn’t smell, and a small bag of recycling.

FLORA and FAUNA
Not that much to see. Flying fish of course, mostly the ones we found on deck were too small to eat. A large one that landed on the cockpit I managed to throw back before it expired. A few birds, and dolphins came to play one evening. There was an awful out of seaweed in the water, not sure if this was because we were in the (favourable) equatorial current. A lot of boats complained about the weed getting round the rudder, the self steering or the water generators that deploy just behind the boat, this didn’t seem to happen to our water generator which towed on 35m of line or our rudders.

The last 200 to 300 miles it got much warmer, but also significantly wetter. I was able to grab my shampoo and have a nice fresh water wash during one squall. We were very pleased that St Lucia appeared ahead just where is was supposed to be – you do wonder after so many days at sea seeing nothing at all …. We were pleased that the wind held up, even increased as we sailed round the top of the island, round Pigeon Island and on to the finish, so that we could complete the passage under sail with no engine hours. I’m not sure about the competitive aspect of the ARC, with the rally control sending daily position reports it was difficult not to get sucked into it, although we were all definitely cruisers some took it more seriously than others. It did serve to concentrate the mind on making progress as did reports in the books we’ve read of the mileage made by others in small boats. Our daily miles made good varied between 110 and nearly 150 – remember this was miles made toward the destination as we were going on the GPS. In the end, taking into account the handicaps and engine hours (which were penalised heavily in this year of good winds) we were 5th in our class (the middle one, mind you a lot of the smaller boats beat us).

Mostly our watch system of 3 hours on 3 hours off during the hours of darkness with more casual arrangements during the day worked OK. towards the end as we closed on St Lucia we did have a couple of nights were neither got much sleep as the variable wind meant we needed to gybe a few times and both were needed on deck. We did arrive still talking to each other and we did enjoy ourselves.

We crossed the finish line 06.23 local time (GMT-1) on Sunday morning so just less than 7 days for the passage.  It’s been a busy few days in Mindelo with lots of boat work to do – and a couple of parties.  The whole fleet is together on the pontoons here so it’s very sociable, folk helping each other lending tools. Our final position was 9th in our class taking into an count handicap and motoring hours so we were far from last.  Looking forward to starting off again towards St Lucia tomorrow.  There is also a blog on the World cruising club web site that we can update with the SSB radio as we go along so you might like to look at that.  Will post more and pics when I get better internet!

Crossed the line just inside the windward end at 13.04.55. Only 5 min late but at least we didn’t hit anything and we’re not last. Lovely sunny day gentle breeze from ENE broad reach. May Have to consider cruising chute but expect more wind later due to acceleration zone by the island.  Go to Atlantic crossing page to see how to track us as we sail across.

Or will the list ever be finished?  Hopefully just a few things to tidy up now, the last shopping to get and stow, last washing to do, fill with water and so on.  The skippers briefing is 1200 tomorrow and we set sail on Sunday. We put up all the signal flags to “dress the ship overall” but unfortunately they are a bit small – Mum actually made them for a 31 ft boat and we are 41 ft, so instead of having flags going up the front of the mast and down to the back of the boat I just put them in one string up the front.  It still looks pretty but no doubt the purists would complain.

There was a costume party on Wednesday, the theme was 80s films.  The only one I could think of was Ghostbusters, so we had goggles and rucksacks with a tube and a funnel or the Hoover tube plus signs with the logo – sorted.  Just a shame that the organisers and also another boat had the same idea, but they did play our music.

The tension is racking up, everyone has their lists of stuff to be done.  We had our safety check on Saturday (in pouring rain!), the yellow brick tracker was fitted just now and we are gradually filling all available space in the boat with food.  A bit of light relief today though as we went on a tree planting expedition – they are sponsoring an ARC forest.  They bussed us to the location and it was really interesting to see a bit more of the island, so green compared to volcanic Lanzarote and great views once we’d climbed the hill to the tree planting site.  In fact it’s a holiday today, so the ships chandlers are all shut so not all that much can get done anyway.  The crew dinner is tonight, the seminars which do look very informative are on Tuesday and Wednesday with safety demonstrations on Thursday, Fancy dress party Wednesday (80s films – anybody got any ideas?) and Farewell party on Friday.

Farewell to Lanzarote and a good crossing to Gran Canaria, great views of Fuerteventura on the way.  There was more wind than forecast so we had a good sail. We tried out the towed generator with some trepidation once we’d slowed down a bit, but it seemed to work ok and as wind had died completely by the time we took it in at midnight this was easy to do.  We then motored the rest of the way, arriving in Las palmas first thing.  The marina is huge, you take a ticket like at Argos to queue to check in at the office.  We are stern to the pontoon with lazy lines to bow ropes.  Rather terrifying as we’ve not done this sort of mooring before so was glad of the marineros help/instruction this time.  The ARC rally stuff kicks off on Friday so it is all getting very exciting.  We have a growing list of stuff to check over before we set

off.

Another short hop to this huge Marina right at the south end of the island.  At least the rain showers have held off – there was a weather warning pinned to toilet door but it referred only to rain not wind.  A few tall ships are in, including one from Jersey, Eye of the Wind.  We are sadly saying goodbye to Marco from Arno elettronica, so hopefully all the electronics will continue to work when we leave Lanzarote.  He gave us a generous present of a whole fresh cheese, very exclusive as it is made by a friend of his who has a small herd of goats.

Just a short hop down the coast of Lanzarote to test out the systems – new autopilot, instruments, alternator and of course the adjusted rudder bearings.  We also ran the generator and watermaker. We’d had a few very heavy but short lived rain showers over the last few days that had us running to get in washing and shut hatches, but the ones we saw out at sea passed us by.  The marina here at Puerto Calero is a bit posher than the one in Arrecife (and it costs more), but the pontoons etc are noticeably older.  All the marinas here employ Marineros who meet you or usher you into the designated berth and take the lines.   Totally unlike home where you almost always have to do it yourself.  Trouble is sometimes the Marineros know what they are doing, sometimes they insist on mooring up the boat “their” way and grump when you do it differently, sometimes they do what you ask with the rope … But sometimes they have no idea (trying to hold the boat rather than putting the rope round the cleat) and you realise it would have been much simpler to do it yourself.

Timshel was lifted out of the water on Wednesday for the rudder bearings to be fixed.  They used the small travel hoist which seemed normal size to us, but they also have an absolutely humungus one (but strangely there do not seem to be any cradles to put boats into?).  Luckily she was only out of the water for a few hours and stayed in the slings until she was relaunched.  Steve took the opportunity to clean the hull a bit and change an anode, but in fact there was only a little slime on the hull, it was remarkably clean, so either the Coppercoat is doing its work or the fish in the marina have eaten off any fouling.  It was very disappointing to have to get more work done on the rudder, given that it had been done before we left the marina in Scotland, and we’d waited almost a month for the work to be done.  In retrospect it felt a bit stiff when we left, but we assumed this was just because the bearings were new, after all it had been fixed by the experts what did we know.  We spend so little time actually steering the boat we had not quite realised how stiff and immovable it had become.  Happily it is now much better and the new autopilot has been fitted to replace the one that had given up the struggle with the immoveable rudder and died.

We have been doing other jobs while waiting, a few more mods to the alternator and charging system to be completed then we shall be on our way again.  We consulted our Fishing book and bought some kit for setting up a strong ocean trolling line from one of the well stocked fishing shops in town.the book says that the size of the fish you catch is related to the size of the lure you use, so we restricted ourselves to some modest lures not wishing to catch any 50 lb monsters.  As well as the gaff hook in the picture, we bought some cheap vodka for pouring into the gills to subdue a lively fish on deck.

On Wednesday we hired a car for the day – very convenient from the marina and visited Montanas del Fuego Timanfaya (the Fire Mountain Volcano), you get a bus tour around the amazing landscape and by the visitor centre they have a hole which burns and smaller ones which shot plumes of steam when they put in water.  I think the last eruption was early 19th Century.

We looked at the beautiful west coast, you can see why all the ports are on the other side, and a very interesting wine museum and Bodega, El Grifo.  It is interesting that in fact the volcanic eruptions enabled them to grow grape vines.  The vines are mostly planted in a dip in the black volcanic soil with a little wall (built of volvcanic Rock) around the plant and there is no irrigation, the volcanic soil sucks up and holds any moisture that there is in the air. Of course we also got to taste some wine.  And looked at the cactus garden.

We we visited the house of the artist  Cesar Manrique, where you can see his work and also the fantastic house that he designed and built, the lower floor is actually made in bubbles in the volcanic rock as is the pool.

Lastly we went to get our Lidl fix as its a bit out of town and stocked up with some stuff for the big passage.