Part 3– Saturday, April 24, 2010
If you missed parts 1 and 2, you may want to scroll down and read them first.
At 0800 I wrote down our anchored location in the ship’s log. We went up to the aft deck and looked over the situation. We had plenty of room to turn the boat after the anchor came up. We could sail slowly between two boats behind us, then past another one. At that point we had a clear shot out to the banks and to our first waypoint at Sandy Cay.
We have always felt that God gave us each other and God gave us the dream to sail together. We give thanks every day for the beauty and the adventures God has given us in this life. As we were about to embark upon the most challenging passage in our sailing life, we knew that we needed to rely on God more than ever. No matter how skilled we might be, and no matter how well we planned, we were about to go forth on God’s huge ocean in a boat that the ocean could disassemble if it chose. We are convinced that God always wants us to use the gifts he has given us to their fullest extent, but we are likewise convinced that God wants to be with us through it all.
We bowed our heads in prayer. We read Psalm 62 as a prayer. We prayed for God’s presence and his guidance and protection for our journey. We were ready to leave, but it was not time to stop praying. On this trip we lived the truth of “pray without ceasing.” It was no time to be careless or cocky. It was time to go.
We raised the mainsail. Larry went to the bow as I took the helm. When he signaled that the anchor was up, I turned hard to port. Larry came back to the cockpit and deployed the staysail, which gave us the extra speed we needed to make the turn. Gently, slowly, gracefully, we sailed between the boats and out toward the banks. Soon we were clear and the passage was begun.
It was a gorgeous morning. The sky was clear with only wispy clouds. We looked back toward the Pig Beach for the last time. Then we looked forward. We soon came near enough to our waypoint to make the northward turn. The wind was ESE. We gibed gently and kept moving toward our goal. It felt very good.
When we reached the first marker on the Decca Channel, we continued north a bit. The channel runs due west, but we really could not stay on that straight line with our following ESE wind. We gibed about 4 times before we were far enough along the channel to head northwest toward the Tongue of the Ocean.
As we reached the central marker of the channel, we were on a northerly tack. We had hoped to miss the coral heads in that general vicinity, but we found ourselves in a small patch despite everything. Larry went forward and spotted while I steered. It seemed like a long time, but it was probably less than an hour before we were clear. It was one of the great moments of the trip. We had navigated through a large patch of coral under sail without any shouting and no scrapes, either. We were very thankful.
By the time we had cleared the channel it was mid-afternoon. Larry decided to run the generator and get the batteries back up to a good level. He went below. I took the helm. Pretty soon he came back up. “I guess I didn’t get the water intake as far below the water line as I thought,” he said. “The generator isn’t getting any cooling water on this tack. We have to wait until we are on the starboard side.” That news was not desirable, but neither was it devastating.
After our next gibe, Larry went below again to run the generator. Again, he quickly returned to the cockpit. “I think we have a bigger problem,” he said. “I’m going to need to look at things.” He went below and dug into the problem. Our generator is installed beneath our bed in the aft cabin. To work there, he had to fold up the bed, remove the casing of the generator and try to do this work as we were sailing. Fortunately, the wind was running 14-17 knots, and we had little turbulence. Soon he came back up with a solemn look on his face.
It turned out that the water pump had lost one of its impeller blades. That blade was obviously stuck in a hose somewhere impeding the flow of cooling water to the generator. Larry could not tell where that blade might be without pulling out all the hoses and checking each one. The sun would set within the hour. That work could not be done at that time. Who knew when he would get the opportunity?
Without knowing when we would get to recharge the batteries again, we had to take severe measures. We turned off everything non-essential, and that included the refrigerator. Our refrigerator will keep things cold for three or four days, as long as your definition of “cold” is generous. We had canned food to fall back on. We simply could not afford to run the refrigerator in this crisis. We left very few breakers on.
These five items were the only drain on our batteries until the very end of our trip. They drew the batteries down at the rate of about .1 volt per day. It is a good thing we took this action, because Larry was not able to find the blockage in the generator’s water system until the day we departed for the Gulf Stream crossing. After he found it, we ran the generator and were able to charge the batteries sufficiently to allow us to use our e-charts as we drew near to Lake Worth.
Whenever we were below decks at night, we used flashlights. The refrigerator did a pretty good job until the last day. We used the galley foot pump for water. We had a supply of ground coffee and a press pot for our morning java. We cook with propane, so we had hot meals. With all our constraints we still had everything that was truly essential.
So, this is how we sailed into the first night of our journey.
At sunset we discussed whether to reduce sail. We really wanted to avoid the necessity of a sail change in the dark. I gathered together my weather predictions. Both Chris Parker and the Tongue of the Ocean buoy predicted 15-17 knots. We had been sailing with winds at this speed all day, and we concluded that if they were to continue we did not need to change anything.
We were wrong. Our logic was right, but our information was wrong. As the evening progressed, so did the wind speed. First it was 20 knots. Then it crept up to 25 sustained. Then I saw 30 knots skim by on the wind speed indicator. That was it for me. We began to adjust things. We reduced the genoa by about half, but that was not enough. Eventually we furled it completely, leaving only the staysail deployed. We sailed for a few minutes in that configuration, but it was still extremely difficult to hold a course. The wind and wave frequently conspired to throw the boat as much as 40 degrees off course in a matter of seconds. Over and over. (When dawn came we could see how confused the seas were. Clearly, a swell from the north or northeast was countering waves generated by an east to southeast wind. It was a mess.) We reduced the main to the first batten.
With that adjustment, we gained control without losing too much speed. Both of us had grown quite weary fighting with all that sail. At that point, Larry was able to go back to sleep. Overnight the max wind speed recorded was 31.9 knots. Although we had a lot of weather yet to come, we never recorded any wind speed higher than that.
One of the things I learned to like about sailing at night instead of motoring at night is the quality of my rest. When the engine is running and I go below, the noise only gets louder. I dare not wear ear plugs to sleep. I need to be able to hear Larry call if he needs me, but with the engine running, there is so much noise and vibration that it is extremely difficult to get real rest. Under sail, after I adjusted to the pilot berth instead of my bed, I actually slept quite well. We set a kitchen timer to wake us at the end of our sleep time, and each of us had the experience of actually sleeping right through it a time or two, despite its loud beeping right beside our heads. If we make more extended passages, I certainly want to sail rather than motor if the winds are right.
I will never forget that run up the Tongue of the Ocean. It was a moonlight night, only a day or two past full. There were occasional clouds, but the sky remained generally clear. We simply flew. The sounds of wind and water were beautiful as we scooted north. This is why we have a sailboat instead of a trawler. It was wonderful. I didn’t need a diesel engine or a generator in order to enjoy that experience.
So ended the first day.
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