An Atlantic crossing - Gomera (Canary Islands) to Tobago (Caribbean)

Daily Mileages
 
Daily run noon to noon over the ground. First day started at 10:40.
The 25hr days are due to the zone time change from UT in Gomera to UT-4 in Tobago. 
 
8th Feb 109 25.33hr run
9th 83 
10th 116 
11th 118 25hr day
12th 122 
13th 134 
14th 154 25hr day
15th 134 
16th 131 
17th 136 
18th 130 
19th 133 
20th 134 25hr day
21st 143 
22nd 139 
23rd 131 
24th 113 
25th 142 
26th 137 
27th 145 25hr day
28th 139 
1st Mar 88 
2nd 123 
 3rd 60  
 
Total Miles 2984 nautical miles over the ground. Total Time 24d 5h 34m.
Best Day's Run 154nm on the 14th (25hr day)
Worst Day's Run 83nm on the 9th (3rd Mar was less due to heaving-to off Tobago awaiting sunrise) 
 
Weather

Berthed in San Sebastian in Gomera with access to the internet, I was able to watch the pattern of movement of the Azores high pressure system and the depressions in the North Atlantic.  There was roughly a ten day cycle as the centre of the high oscillated east and west, with some north and south movement.  When the high moves west it allows depressions over the Azores and Madeira and the Iberian peninsula to trail their cold fronts down across the Canaries and some distance to the south bringing north westerly, westerly, even south westerly winds, heavy rain and strong gusty winds together with large seas.  To avoid getting caught by the fronts I waited till the high was centred just to the NW of the Canary Islands before departing.  This would likely bring light wind conditions but give me time to establish a daily routine and get experience with the new Hydrovane self-steering which I hadn't used before.  As it turned out the winds were light for a few days after clearing El Hierro in the Canaries but we didn't have to motor to maintain progress and we used white sails.  The swell was generally too great to allow cruising chutes to stay full.  I did try the mizzen chute briefly once but it wasn't helping with speed or steering. 
 
Once south of the Canaries we experienced easterly flows with a lot of high cirrus cloud mixed with cumulus and shower activity particularly around sunset.  Even without rain the decks would be wet with dew after sunset as we neared the low pressure zone south of the Cape Verde Islands.  At times the wind reached 20-25 knots as we worked our way SW towards a selected turning point at 20 degrees north, 27 degrees west, but was generally 15-20 knots and the direction varied from east to north east. 
 
From the turning point, where our course aimed at a great circle* route to Tobago, the winds were generally around 20-25 knots with direction varying from just east of N to just south of E.  Conditions were anything but stable.  The area is influenced by the equatorial low pressure region and the warm, humid area over the Amazon basin.  We had a continuous stream of showers and squalls, night and day with grey overcast skies most of the time.  The squalls were strongest at night with gusts to 32 knots apparent observed but generally the maximum was 25 knots apparent.  When I was awake (which was mostly) I avoided the worst of the showers and squalls by observing their tracks on radar as the heaviest area of rain gives a strong x-band return. 
 
Often there would be a build up of cirrus, then altocumulus cloud with a rising swell which usually indicates strong wind on the way, but nothing ever happened.  The cloud drifted away, the swell dropped but only to rise again later.  The swell rose with stronger winds and then dropped away again and we usually needed to maintain 6 knots (ground speed ) to maintain steerage and avoid being slewed around by the bigger waves.  From the daily mileages you can see we didn't average 6 knots often, so there was a lot of slewing. 
 
There were occasional, sudden gaps in this pattern when the sky cleared and we sailed free under blue skies or through star filled nights with generally stronger breezes but they didn't last.  The sea varied with wind strength and direction and with so much variation, there was usually a cross sea running which made sail trim difficult when the wind was lighter and made the yacht's motion unstable a lot of the time.  The VXA 2D Hydrovane handled it all extremely well though, provided it was given a fairly balanced boat to trim.  We gybed a few times but only with light conditions, usually with a large sea on one quarter and the wind on the other, conditions in which any steering system or human helmsman would struggle.  The yacht also turned towards the wind when the wind speed increased but once the gust was through she came back on to the set apparent wind.  Where there was a true change in wind strength more standing helm would be applied to balance her and sometimes reefing would be required.  I discovered here that my hydraulic steering system has a creep which caused standing helm to drift away over time, especially at high rudder angles and boat speeds and swell forces.  I'm not sure if this is design inherent or can be improved with a reseal of the helm pumps and/or drive cylinders.  There is a very slight weep on the starboard cylinder.  Not serious anyway, just means more sleep lost as she comes up to weather and needs to be balanced again. 
 
We were afforded a respite on the 26th and 27th Feb and during the day of the 28th with clear weather and generally lighter wind which allowed the sea to moderate.  I slept well for two nights.  However on the 28th Feb the showers returned and stayed with us until the very last.  As we were motoring the last mile to Scarborough I turned her up to weather and dodged a shower with 25 knots of wind for twenty minutes before making entry to the unfamiliar port.  I had received a vhf nav warning on the presence of an unmarked wreck in the fairway and had no desire to run into that. 
 
Here in Scarborough the weather starts with showers in the morning but the sun breaks out and the humidity builds from around 9 a.m. with a light breeze here in the anchorage.  Life in the tropics. 
 
Current 
 
Chart 4014 states that the Canary Current sets SW at rates from 0.5-1.5 knots and the North Equatorial Current sets west with the same rate and chart 4013 states that close to Tobago the Equatorial Current sets NW with a rate of 1.5 knots.  So we had assistance from the current as well as following winds.  The 20 year old instrument which measures boat speed through the water was inaccurate and I have yet to fit the transducer/log which interfaces to the new SimNet instrumentation network I'm running, so I was unable to measure the rates we actually experienced.  However, when hove-to off Tobago waiting for the morning we were stemming a current which was setting NW of about the charted rate. 
 
Actually I do carry a Mk III Knotmaster Log by Walker but this measures distance so I would have to differentiate that with respect to time in order to obtain speed and need to fit the shoe on the handrail and I had more than enough to do in the variable conditions we had. 
 
Fishing 

In the past, before this passage, I've often trolled a lure from the boat but never had the slightest indication of a take.  On this run it's been easy to get fish to take but a bit more difficult to get them on board.  I need a net for the smaller fish and a gaff for the big ones. 
 
I'm using an International Game Fishing Association 50lb class outfit loaded with 250m of 60lb monofilament line.  This fits in one of two 'rocket launcher' type rod holders on the quarters.  I've used only weighted plastic squid lures but have had good results.  Taking advice from The Cruisers Handbook of Fishing by Scott Bannerot and Wendy Bannerot, I troll the lures about three boat lengths back, with a light drag setting and aim to have them breaking surface to create some life and disturbance to attract the attention of fish we sail past. 
 
The action began almost immediately on the first evening around sunset, a prime fish feeding time, with a take off El Hierro the most southerly of the Canary Islands.  However it pulled off on the retrieve as I didn't stop the boat.  At that early stage I was more hungry for miles than fresh fish.  First boating came on the 9th around 0900.  I was down below just about to brush my teeth when the scream of the reel's click drag brought me speedily on deck.  I took the rod out of the holder, jabbed it to set the hook then put it back in the holder with the drag loose.    The wind was fairly light so I just brought the boat onto a beam reach to slow her down and hauled in my catch.  We were lucky as the hook had pulled out and the fish came in with a bight of line around its tail.  A few strokes on the sharpening stone with the filleting knife and I had delicious lunch material for two days.  I think it was a Skipjack Tuna of about 1.5kg.  I bled the fish before cleaning or filleting, as recommended by the experts, as I intended to make sashimi from one fillet.  Bleeding just requires two short, deep incisions behind the pectoral fins to sever the main arteries. 
 
The 9th was the golden day.  Around 1200 I reeled in a second fish of the same species and size but it fell off lifting it from the water.  Later, at sunset, a third fish, same type again but around 2 or 3 kg with some fight in it, again fell off when boating. 
 
The 12th brought a frustrating morning trying to get the yacht balanced and steering a course due to constantly shifting winds.  By 1030 things were finally settled when from down below I heard that screaming drag again.  This time I was too late on deck.  We were sailing at around 6.5 knots and the reel was half empty by the time I got to it with no sign of the fish turning and running towards the boat.  Usual routine, set the hook, rod in holder, roll up the yankee, turn into the wind with main rudder and reset windvane to hold her there, then back to the fish.  By then the reel was empty, all 250m having unwound.  The fish was still on though and it didn't feel too big, however it pulled off on the retrieve.  When all that line was back on the drum I found the shock leader knot to the Bimini twist double line had failed.  So, I lost my deadly tandem green squid rig.  I wonder if that fish is still dragging it around together with ten meters of shock leader.  If so, I'm sure it will be food for something soon.   

On the 16th Feb it was CHENG FENG who did the fishing.  In the pre-dawn I was on deck dealing with a shower which brought stronger winds, by reefing sails.  Once past it left a dramatic sky, perfect for a photo, so I went below for the camera.  When I returned on deck, the sun now coming up, the long dead eye of a flying fish stared back at me from the port cockpit drain channel.  I'd had fry on deck for the previous few days but this was the first breakfast size specimen.  All the books by singlehanders in the tropics speak of these fish and their habit of landing on deck.  This was a plump one and when wet with saltwater in the cleaning it showed its bright blue upper body and contrasting white underparts.  Most pelagic fish have this basic dark/light colouration as it makes them harder to see from above or below against the bottom or the sky.  Whether the fish is predator or prey it pays to blend in to your surroundings.  I'd never had one in the hand before, or the pan for that matter.  So, seconds later, being about breakfast time, the fish was cleaned and sizzling in hot fat.  Hot oil from the first pressings of Andalucian olives, actually.  If you've never tasted fresh flying fish I can report it to be a firm, white flesh with a light texture and a delicate flavour.  It's not unlike the Spanish salmonete which look like very immature red gurnard.  They're just the right size for a breakfast course too. 

To end that day which became almost cloudless in the afternoon, the wind dropping, we boated another bonito, smaller than the first but just as tasty.  Being another sunset take, this one was bled, cleaned and refrigerated for the day after. 

After that CHENG FENG took over again.  It seemed the flying fish had organised things amongst themselves to provide me with a thin, but regular, supply of fish protein.  The second one was had on the 18th, then the third on the 21st and the last on the 27th.  One of them had a large sea louse on its left pectoral root and another had a sort of leech on its bottom lip so there's a whole ecosystem based on these fish.  There are a lot of them, once we entered their domain they were taking to the air around the boat constantly.  It's interesting that they don't board yachts during the day so this indicates good vision and navigation in the air and explains why they're always breakfast food.  They don't actually fly like birds, flapping their fins, they can only glide.  Watching them it's clear they know the direction of the wind whilst under water as they almost always take off into it to gain lift and then glide off across the wind, sometimes beating the surface with their tails as they re-enter to take off again, into the wind, for two or three glides.  The lower tailfin is enlarged to aid this behaviour and the frying pan is an excellent place to observe the fin structure.  The cooking goes better once you snip it off. 

Close to Tobago on approach to Scarborough I saw another species, much larger, take to the air.  It had enlarged pectoral fins for gliding and it kicked with its tail to hold itself in the air but its flight was not so long. 
 
The 28th was exciting.  I gybed early in the morning and as it was the first opportunity since early in the passage to run the desalination plant with light winds and a moderate sea, I did that to get the freshwater tanks topped up.  At 1230 I had some coucous soaking and was wondering what to have with it when zzz.zzzz..zzz....zzzzzzzzzzz....that screaming drag again.  This time it was clear when setting the hook that the fish had a lot more mass than before.  I brought the boat up and pumped in something obviously different and bigger than Bonito or Skipjack Tuna.  When it got close to the boat and rolled, exhausted, it revealed the streamlined, torpedo body shape and telltale light blue, vertical stripes on its darker, dorsal surface.  I'd never seen one but knew it instantly from photos in books.  It was a wahoo (acanthocybium solanderi - no doubt classified by Dr. Solander the Swede who was with Cook and Banks on the first voyage).  Wahoo is not a joke, this really is the common name for this species.  I took this one on a pink plastic squid and fortunately as it was almost lifeless at the boat I was able to lift it out and into the cockpit, securely hooked in the tough gill structure.  It filled the cockpit at 1.10m from tip of head to fork of tail and probably had a mass of 10-12 kg.  The dorsal colours are iridescent and they change with the state of excitement of the fish.  I didn't want to be eating wahoo every meal for a week or more so, in the interests of conservation (of me) I cut four good steaks from the tail section and heaved the rest over the side.  It would have died anyway had I returned it whole.  I'm sure in 4,000m of water it would be entirely consumed before it hit the bottom. 
 
Cetaceans 
 
With all the flying fish out there would be plenty for dolphins and porpoises but I saw none after the 12th Feb.  I saw odd groups near the Canaries, a splashy pod on the 10th which didn't visit the boat, probably feeding and the last on the 12th, a pod of common dolphin which came over for the surf.  I saw no sign of whales. 
 
Birdlife 
 
There weren't many birds either.  I saw a small gull like bird most often, usually solitary but sometimes two or three of them.  They would follow the boat for a while and then disappear.  Nearer to Tobago I saw white tailed tropic birds on several occasions and close to the island I saw female frigate birds with the white throat patches.  There are other impressive large seabirds close to Tobago with a gliding flight. 
 
I saw Wilson's storm petrels occasionally.  These small birds nest on islands in the South Atlantic and migrate on north south routes.  Incredible distances to travel over the year with that busy, fluttering flight. 

I saw shearwaters too, occasionally.  They also nest in the south and migrate on circuitous routes around the entire ocean every year but with their absolute mastery of gliding flight it's easier to see how they do it on the meagre pickings on the ocean surface.  
  
Bioluminescence 
 
I wrote this after a previous passage from Bermuda to Falmouth in the colder waters to the north. 
 
'Whilst little compares to sailing under a full moon in a clear sky, such conditions deny the sailor the visual spectacle of the ocean creatures which glow in the dark.  It is the dark nights with no moon or heavy cloud cover that allow these wonders to show themselves.  Many beings are drawn to light in the dark.  Moths find it irresistible.  Deer and rabbits freeze in the headlights.  People too are captivated by displays of fireworks and lasers.  In combination with water, the origin of all life, in which we spent our first months and the easy motion of a seaworthy boat, powered by the wind, it's mesmerising.   
 
The seized motor had locked the propeller so that it imparted a vortex to the water as it passed over the blades.  This gave Silent Knight a vapour trail under the surface, a uniform faint, green white glow in the water, which persisted long behind her.  Against this faint aura, frequent bright pinpoints of light would burst to intensity then quickly fade in the wake to be replaced by endless others.  Occasional pulses of light would appear as a sphere of luminous green which grew in size in such a way as to draw the eye to search for the brighter centre.  But the mysterious centre was hidden by the growing light in the outer layers, until the whole faded away.  These beautiful, pulsing spheres were sociable, appearing in groups of four or five.' 
 
On this passage, the pinpoints were there, as always, and the spheres appeared but down here in the south they pulsed with a much higher frequency, just a flash.  And they were alone. 
 
Shipping 
 
I saw little shipping outside the Canaries area until we neared Tobago.  I use an AIS (Automatic Identification System) receiver setup to monitor the proximity of shipping for the purposes of collision avoidance.  I modified an old vhf transceiver to give an unfiltered baseband audio signal to the soundcard on the laptop which runs some decoding software from COAA a group of interested astronomers based in Portimao on the Algarve.'  Their website www.shipplotter.com  gives contact details. Their Shipplotter software is downloadable online and you get a free 3 week trial, after which, if you like it, you pay only €25 euros plus VAT.  You provide it with either an audio signal into the microphone socket on the laptop from a suitable vhf radio or a serial AIS data stream from an AIS receiver into a USB port.  I favour the latter as my system is definitely inferior to a dedicated AIS transponder setup like the Comar csb200 I've seen on another boat, but the Shipplotter software has a much better radar-like display option and produces a radar-like Plan Position Indicator display with CHENG FENG at the centre.  The AIS provides data from ships of course, speed, range and bearing and in combination with own ship position, course and speed, it calculates the cpa (closest point of approach) and the time to the cpa. 
On 11th Feb vhf propagation was phenomenal, as happens sometimes with warm air over a cold sea.  At night I 'saw' several ships, nearest 55nm distant and the furthest 522nm away, the Reserve SAR vessel which I recognised as that which operates from the south of Gran Canaria. 
 
On the 15th regular use of AIS found a vessel close astern making approx. 10 knots with a cpa of 4.5 nautical miles.  The speed was varying though which doesn't happen with healthy ships.  I suspected it could be a large yacht and so it turned out.  Binoculars revealed a yacht of maybe 60-65 feet, motoring.  We were sailing at 5 knots then with main and poled out yankee, the configuration we used all the way for its directional stability and the yacht was observed to unroll her headsail.  However they were rolling and the sail was collapsing and they soon returned to motoring.  They overhauled us and steamed on. 
 
On the 18th I came on deck after making lunch in a heavily rolling condition to unfurl more sail to steady her when I spotted a ship on the port bow.  AIS revealed her to be on the Croatian registry, a general cargo ship with a central crane.  She eventually passed 4.43nm ahead by radar range. 
 
Though I ran the radar at night and during the day in bad visibility with the alarm zone set at 6nm and I ran regular checks on AIS I saw no more ships until the tow appeared ahead on a similar course on the 27th.  Tows are a problem because Rule 18 of the International Regulations for Preventing Collisions at Sea states, 'a sailing vessel underway shall keep out of the way of a vessel restricted in her ability to manoeuvre' which a tug and tow are.  The Sophia D on the Marshall Islands registry, destination Curacao, was being towed astern by the tug Walraad Waltema (on the St Vincent registry) at 5,5 knots.  Sophia D was declaring herself restricted.  I knew about them from 1120 and slowly caught up with them.  By 1730 it became clear a gybe was necessary to get clearance overnight and enable sleep.  I didn't want a wind shift to take us across the towline in the dark whilst I slept, though I'm fairly sure they would have seen us and called us on vhf before that happened.  Prudence dictated a gybe which was inconvenient but after it was completed I found we were on a better course for Tobago as the wind shifted during the gybe.  In allI made 15 gybes all except this one to keep roughly to the great circle track.  The procedure took between 30 and 45 minutes to complete each time as the pole had to be de-rigged and re-rigged on the opposite side with fore guy and after guy and I used two preventers on the main boom for safety. 
 
Rule 18 also requires sailing vessels to keep out of the way of vessels 'not under command' and vessels engaged in fishing.  However, it states that a power driven vessel shall keep out of the way of a sailing vessel, so ships should avoid us, if the bridge team are keeping a proper watch.  I think it's true to say that the only yachtsmen to have died in the past ten years in British waters were killed when, probably, the P&O ferry Pride of Bilbao collided with them south of the Isle of Wight.  There's a slight doubt as the yachtsmen didn't live to tell their side of the story. 
 
Of course, Rule 5 requires a proper watch by sight and hearing at all times by all vessels,  which lone yachtsmen cannot comply with.  For this reason I think single handed sailing is irresponsible and unseamanlike, but I also think that description fits many deck officers on the world's ships. 
 
On 1st March in showers bringing visibility down to less than two miles I saw a ship on the port bow.  Observing her with AIS her cpa was 0.9nm at 0734 at 13.8 knots.  Less than one mile is too close for me with the changes in speed and course of a sailing yacht.  I reefed both yankee and main to slow down and allow her to pass ahead as she showed no signs of altering course.  She was on the Greek registry and Greek seamanship has decreased somewhat since the days of Odysseus, evidenced by the number of ferries which sink every year in Greek waters.  At 0747 she passed 6.6 cables ahead and disappeared visually in a shower at a distance of 1.8 nm by radar range. 
 
On the run into Tobago there were several ships passing to the north and to the south of the island through Galleons Passage and a British cruise ship running up the windward coast probably heading for Barbados. 
 
Although I was concerned in the first half of the voyage, I didn't run into any 'cayucos' the 17m wooden Senagalese fishing boats used by sub-Saharan Africans to cross from Mauritania to the Canary Is.  Just prior to departure, one arrived in Gomera at Playa Santiago, just south of San Sebastian and another, abandoned, was on the NAVTEX system positioned on the route to my chosen turning point.  I heard a boat participating in the Atlantic Rally for Cruisers last November fell in with a cayuco full of immigrants.  They threw over some water and sailed away for fear of being overwhelmed.  Some of these boats arrive with almost 200 people on board usually dehydrated and hungry and cold. 

Food 
 
CHENG FENG has a 110 litre fridge box chilled by a 12V compressor which uses a novel cooling technique utilising a heat exchanger in a special through hull fitting used for the galley sink drain.  The difference in diameter between the through hull aperture and the sink drain hose leads to a self-pumping action which effectively transfers heat to the surrounding seawater as the yacht rolls.  The box was filled with fresh fruit and vegetables in San Sebastian.  I was careful to ship enough Gomeran bananas for the entire voyage, being assured the green ones would keep indefinitely, refrigerated and ripen in about a week.  At one stage though, I had six going off in the cargo net so I stewed them in a pan with the crumbled bark of the cinnamon tree and plenty of fresh grated nutmeg.  A delicious treat, but it left me with acute serotonin depletion the next day and so, having no MDMA to hand, I had to tear into a large chocolate bar.  I ate the last apple on the last day.  The vegetables didn't keep as long, with the exception of the cabbage and the cristophene.  The latter is a pear shaped, prickly, green vegetable like a hard, crunchy cucumber, without the seeds  and is common in Madeira and the Canary Is.  I still have onions, garlic and fresh ginger though that grew a white mould which had to be scraped off.  The bananas are not as good after a long period of refrigeration and anyway, there's no shortage of them here in the West Indies. 
 
I shipped three whole cheeses from San Sebastian, a delectable queso blanco which is a mixture of sheep and goat cheese and two hard mature cheeses also goat/sheep blend I think,  which don't need refrigeration, though they grew a good layer of penicillin on the rind left in the cabin.  They're extremely good too. 
 
I'm carrying lots of dried fruit, dates, figs and nuts in the dry stores mostly to improve the rolled oats and sunflower seeds passed off as 'muesli' in Spanish supermarkets.  The yogurt ran out a week before the end.  I must have a quiet word with the purser about that. 
 
In praise of the cabbage, I don't know of a better vegetable to take on a long voyage.  They keep well, especially refrigerated, retain their flavour, can be eaten raw or lightly cooked and of course, they're highly nutritious.  There was a school of Chinese art devoted to the carving of cabbages in green jade, usually with a grasshopper on the side.  The Chinese were well aware of the life sustaining properties of brassicas. 
 
For a long time now, lunch has been my principal meal.  Dinner becomes a savoury snack, easily digested before turning in.  You don't need a lot of food before sleeping. 
 
I had lots of fresh fish protein as I've said, all of it lightly fried in extra virgin olive oil or eaten raw.  Wahoo, particularly, is susceptible to overcooking leading to dryness and loss of flavour.  There's little risk of ciguatera poisoning from offshore fish.  The first bonito was large enough to fillet one side and to make ceviche and sashimi from the other.  Ceviche is raw tuna, capsicum and onion, chopped and marinated in lemon juice and chilled overnight.  Sashimi is chilled raw tuna, sliced and served with soy sauce and wasabi mustard.  I left the bloodline in as, though a bit unsightly, it's a good source of omega 3 fatty acids.  I had the fried fish with a cabbage/cristophene based salad and starch in the form of jasmine scented Thai rice or
couscous or pasta.  The salads were dressed with extra virgin olive oil and balsamic vinegar, a pinch of rosemary or basil and a sprinkle of coarse, sea salt.  I like to season couscous with green anis and add marinated black olives for that Mediterranean sensation.  Pasta is also good, fast and high energy but it uses a lot of water in the cooking unlike rice which wastes none. 
 
I also baked a lot of bread, about every two days.  The first batch wasn't cooked long enough but after that the CHENG FENG bakery was putting out some very palatable breads, my favourite being the raisin and walnut wholemeal though it was a little dry, as wholemeal tends to be.  I had some 'strong' flour recommended 'para elaborar panes especiales'.  This is a superior bread flour, you can really feel the gluten strands fighting back as you work it, but it's white.  It's great toasted though. 
 
Water 
 
Water is the most precious resource on an ocean crossing voyage, to be guarded at all times.  CHENG FENG carries 800 litres in two stainless steel tanks so if one is contaminated or leaks, there is a reserve.  If both were contaminated or both leaked I took 30 litres of mineral water as a month's survival ration.  Then there's the desalination plant which produces 21 litres per hour on 10 Amperes of electricity.  I was able to use the plant on only four occasions due to the sea state and boat speed.  Being a hydraulic system, it is prone to getting air locked. 
Nevertheless, I arrived in Scarborough, where we lie to our anchor with no water supply, with almost full tanks, having showered daily for the 24 days.  There's no need to live like the French just because you're offshore.  I didn't, but it is also possible to collect rain.  I was avoiding the rain as there's usually a lot of wind associated with it. 
 
The power for battery charging comes primarily from the 4kW diesel genset, backed up by a 135W photovoltaic array and a 60A alternator on the main engine.  The genset was completely reliable, thanks to a lot of time and parts in maintenance prior to departure.  It also ran without problems in the heavy rolling swells of the trades.  Where does the fuel come from?  CHENG FENG carries 660 litres of fuel oil in two tanks.  As we motored for only 6h40m we had ample reserve. 
 
Crew 
 
The crew suffered no more than the usual sea cuts on the hands and toes through contact with deck fittings and a loss of skin through abrasion of rope on wet hands and sleep deprivation, but not to the extent of hallucination, which happened on the Cadiz-Porto Santo run with two extra crew to keep watch.  One of them, Kathryn, had a concealed phobia of cabbage due to an unfortunate, childhood experience.  I wondered why it wasn't appearing in any of her dishes and found it moulding in a locker one day.  I stripped off a few leaves and put it in a more airy place.  Next morning Kathryn was looking out of sorts, I assumed seasickness due to the motion which was bad in a confused sea, but she denied it.  Much later she admitted that she had opened a locker to take out a plate and the cabbage had leapt out and butted her.  Cabbages are sometimes aware. 
 
With that experience and having shipped a French woman for the Madeira- Graciosa (Canary Is.) passage who turned out to be of no use to man nor beast, I decided to attempt the crossing single handed.  I regret nought.  There was a continuous trickle of Lonely Planet types walking the dock in Santa Cruz looking to enlist as crew but I was unimpressed by all of them.  They were mostly French and required to be taken to Brazil.  One typical pair put a tempting notice on the board reading something like, 'A sculptor and a plastician artist, French, looking to crew on sailing boat'.  I saw those two, young, dreadlocks, packs on like they were sleeping rough, every day for 3 weeks down at the marina, looking for their ideal boat.  It has to be something in the French psyche which tells them that a skipper would want a sculptor on his boat.  Surely this should be deeply hidden behind a sheaf of sailing qualifications and letters of reference from other skippers.  What is a plastician artist?  An artist in Plasticine?  And when we go to immigration in that foreign land, would it be advantageous for the skipper to immigrate people wearing the international symbol of marijuana abuse on their heads?  I ask you.  Nor did I require the didgeridoo players and assorted x-generation youth with their innate sense of entitlement, who think independent adventure is putting themselves completely in the safe hands of people their parent's age to give them something for the social networks.  Thank you. 
 
I was interested to observe any changes in mental condition in that environment, spending three or four weeks isolated from all human contact.  Perhaps original thought would be promoted by the absence of media bombardment.  For this reason I deprived myself of music to enhance the feeling of solitude.  I didn't attempt to communicate with the vessels we fell in with.  The vhf radio was switched off unless there was a risk of collision.  However, after a few days I was tired and the routine tasks of operating the vessel day and night, navigation and feeding, together with the fatigue brought on by a boat’s motion were enough to dull inspiration.  I did read one book, 'Atlantic Fury' by Hammond Innes which I thoroughly enjoyed.  About an intense autumn storm in the Hebrides, NW Scotland.  I picked that one up off the wall near the refuse bins at Marina Santa Cruz in Tenerife, the informal goods exchange point.  In return, I left some ceramic cups and glassware, dating from the boat's previous owners which had no place on an ocean passage. 
 
I leave you with these words:
 
'Twenty years from now, you will be more disappointed by the things you did not do than by the things you did do.  So, throw off the bow lines.  Sail away from safe harbour.  Catch the trade winds in your sails.  Explore.  Dream.  Discover.'
 
Mark Twain 
 
 
Notes

Ground speed is true speed over the earth’s surface as opposed to boat speed which is through the water.  The difference is the surface current and the movement of water within waves which is approximately circular in the vertical plane.
 
* There are two courses ships use to navigate on ocean passages, great circle, which is the shortest distance between two points on the earth's surface and rhumb line which gives a constant course but is a little longer.  Rhumb line is convenient because such a course plots as a straight line on a Mercator projection chart.  Both charts 4014 and 4013 are drawn using Mercator projection.  It was rare that the yacht was on course for Tobago as the wind varied and as we sailed with the true wind about 10 degrees off right astern, to sail more efficiently and with greater directional stability and less roll.

Updates on Steve's cruising (extracts from Steve's emails in italics)

April 2009 Steve continues to keep me informed of his movements, he recently sent me some photographs of food that he cooked on his crossing with the comment 'I thought maybe some pictures of the food would add to that section.  I went to great pains to take them for the benefit of my mother who thinks I haven't eaten since leaving home 24 years ago', so I have added them to his story.

He has moved from Tobago to Grenada and apears to be thinking of carrying out a refit in Trinidad which he also mentioned in a recent email: 'Well, the week's going to be spent starting to plan the next major refit which will probably be done in Trinidad.  I think the prop needs changing or at least trueing, if that's the term.  I get heavy vibration surfing down large swells.  Engine alignment is an issue to.  Genset bearings need changing.  Etc., etc., etc., etc., etc., etc., etc.  Given the likely routeing of Puerto la Cruz, Venezuela then the ABC islands, Columbia, Panama and the Pacific I want to be 'ready' to cruise for a while without access to repair facilities.  I was hoping to get well set up in the Canaries but found it to be another mafia based Centre of Incompetence, where lack of education and intelligence is compensated for with machismo.  But then, I'm fussy.'

February 2010 - Following a trip to England during June and July of 2009 (by air) and then returned to his boat to start his refit. The following are two emails from Steve and photographs just received of his passage from Trinidad to Grenada and then on to Carriacou.

Escape from Trinidad - We’ve finally left Trinidad with it’s deadly human pathogens, its relentless chains of revenge shootings and its steelpan bands and are back in Grenada.

After a couple of nights anchored in Scotland Bay, Trinidad and some day sails, to try to remember how the boat works, I returned to the mindless racket of Harts Cut and the choppy T&T Sailing Association anchorage.  Spoke with Paddy, singlehanding Conachair, his rusty Ebbtide 33, last seen in La Gomera in the Canaries, who’s been berthed at Coral Cove since December.  He chose to sail stressfully onto the dock on arrival as his engine fuel pump had failed and he had no windlass as he’d lost vital parts over the side, during some maintenance activity.

As Trinidad was getting set up for Carnival, reputedly 2nd only to Rio de Janeiro in its liveliness, I got set up to leave the country, to avoid all the drunkenness and promiscuity.  And the noise.  How times change.  Anchored in Scotland Bay again for 3 nights, partly disturbed by carnival-avoiding Trinidadians camping on the shore and running generators to power tree hung lighting.  No bats in the cabin this time, I learned to put the bananas in the fridge and close the hatches.  The days were typical of long weekends with all manner of incompetently handled watercraft, wakeboarders and swimmers all competing for the same square millimetres of surface.  Incredible no-one was killed.  A young girl from the U.S. was daft enough to paddle an open kayak here in the summer and an off duty member of the Trinidad army severed her legs with his 225 h.p. outboard prop.  For example.  Around the same time a local white man ran his motor cruiser into a rock at night killing his wife and putting his guests, one a doctor, in hospital.

Two mega yachts were anchored in the outer bay.  I tried, over two days, to contact M/Y Marion Queen, a 50m Feadship type, to no avail.  I wanted to check my AIS transponder data was being received prior to the passage to Grenada.  Clearly the U.S.C.G approved captain was not even maintaining a watch on vhf.  When the British registered M/Y Vibrant Curiosity (85m l.o.a.) anchored (shown below), I tried them.  An instant response was received from the young English deck officer on the bridge, clearly a little nervous at being responsible for US$100 million of boat, as he forgot to allocate a working channel.  He promptly checked my AIS position on his ECDIS screen and I also had checked my vhf at the same time.  So we were set up for any need to make a distress call on the passage to Grenada.

A 56 foot German boat was reportedly attacked and robbed on this passage in late December by seven armed Venezuelans in an open boat, 40 miles offshore.  The yacht lost most of its electronics and money.  It happened in daylight so I planned to make that part of the passage at night, close to the new moon, without nav lights and to avoid the rhumb line route by motoring 20 miles against wind and sea off the coast of Trinidad in daylight, before heading north and then, after passing clear of the Hibiscus oil production platform, north west, for Grenada.  So, a long 80nm direct passage became a very long and sleepless 115nm, taking 25.5 hours.  I had to avoid an untended net marked with white strobes and the wind and current set me down to a minimum of 16nm from Hibiscus.  The passage was done with AIS transmission but mostly without nav lights, in a shipping channel, with fast ferries crossing to/from Tobago.  The ‘T&T Spirit’ shown above passed 2 ca. down our port side at 15:37 local, making 39 kts and she was closer still to another yacht’s starboard side, under sail. I felt it prudent to show a light, later, when approaching two oddly lit vessels.  Caution and imagination, verging on hallucination, turned them into a tug and tow, both incorrectly lit, with no AIS transmission and a 4.5nm cable between them.  At 1.5nm I saw that the ship to port was a commercial ship, lit as >50m underway, but with bright deck lights all but obscuring the nav lights and seemingly adrift.  I still have no idea about the ship to starboard.  I sailed slowly between them on the main.  There was a ‘not under command’ on AIS south of Hibiscus.  I saw another last year between Tobago and Grenada.  Seems to be the ‘in’ place to lose the steering.

I anchored off St. George’s in the Ross Pt. anchorage and rowed in to the Grenada Yacht Club for clearance.  As I was late to get to the bank for EC$ and return, the unusually flexible authorities allowed me to postpone clearance till the following day.  I decided, mistakenly, to berth at the GYC to make life easier for a few days.  Boats are berthed end-on to the pontoon with a mooring.  The slot carefully selected by the ‘dockmaster’ between two sports fishing vessels with high, flared bows had its mooring 40m out from the pontoon so, partly as he decided to double it through, my longest heavy line was 25m too short and I had to quickly extend it, leaving the helm to do so.  Then, when he eventually paid it out, in island time, we were already up against the downwind vessel.  No damage, very fortunately, but I had to take the solar panel and gangway off the port handrail for safety.  As the stern line then came up short on the knot we were still 3m off the pontoon at the bow so this was the first so-called marina where I got ashore by dinghy.  The ‘dockmaster’ also didn’t know the depth of water off his dock!!

I’m now the somewhat impoverished new owner of a 100m, 22mm mooring line.  I just don’t know where to stow it yet.

The GYC advertisement says proudly, ‘Our new dock offers the best marina facilities in St.George’s’.  A confident enough claim given the presence of Camper & Nicholson’s Port Louis 10 berth megayacht facility.

Still, it was interesting to berth in the lagoon where 66 of the 70 anchored boats were destroyed when hurricane Ivan passed over in 2004.

Saw Yorkshire plumber, Ken and spouse in the chandlery.  They set off with a group of boats, for safety, on the passage north from Trinidad, but suffered an overheating engine and turned back.  Later found due to a clogged filter.  A simple enough diagnosis for a plumber, I would have thought.  It amazes me how many people have the confidence to leave harbour without the basic knowledge required to operate their vessel.  I twice was asked to assist Watson Bigwood (I’m not joking) the Kiwi carpenter, in Trinidad, with electrical defects of such a trifling nature as to defy belief in someone who has sailed his home built sloop from N.Z., although the wiring was done by a Kiwi plumber.  He did suffer a grounding and flooding in the Red Sea, but was towed onto the nearby shore, swamped, by an Egyptian Samaritan, who didn’t even charge a salvage fee, but then dropped dead a week later. 

Possibly the only Egyptian Samaritan lost forever.

Post Script

On leaving the GYC, the new duty dockmaster couldn’t find the water meter readings supposedly taken by Marvin so I was allowed to leave without paying for water.  Justice.

I only wish I’d done a full wash down and filled the tanks.

To Carriacou

Doyle (Grenada resident cruising guide author) says the anchorage outside St. George’s, Grenada just occasionally gets very rolly.  After two rolling nights and days topping up the freshwater tanks and doing the laundry, I sailed up to Carriacou and anchored in Tyrrel Bay in 4.5m on sand.  Pleasant sail up the lee side of Grenada, though the gusty offshore winds interrupted coffee breaks a bit.  Near the north tip the wind backed so we were pushed well to the west of the ’Kick ’em Jenny’ submerged volcano exclusion zone and the surface flow was also strong.  I measured more than 3 knots at times in a W to NW direction.  I carefully timed the passage so that the neap flood tide would be supplementing the NE Equatorial Current for most of the way thus making life as difficult as possible.  According to the Imray-Iolaire chart B3, the ideal predicted  time to be at the north of Grenada is 4 hrs after HW springs Georgetown, Guyana.  We hit a confused sea caused by Carriacou as we approached the island, tacked a few times making only 20 degrees to windward and then motored in to the bay in the lee.  Close in, I heard a loud cry to starboard and was surprised to see the spout of a small whale and its small dorsal fin as it dived.

However, to completely ruin the first enjoyable day in the Caribbean after twelve months, the cabin started to smell of diesel on port tack, indicating all is still not well with the starboard tank.  The leak was so bad it set the bilge pump off.  Great.

The American crew of Scott Free, a Nautical 43, called by to fraternise and to crash their hard dinghy repeatedly into my topsides.  Clearly jealous of my two masts.

Wind 15-20kts overnight becoming 20kts in the morning and gusting 25kts in the p.m.  It has thankfully calmed off today but that's allowing the swell tor roll the yachts.

Interesting breakfast entertainment was provided by two cats coming together on the northern side of the bay.  The Dutch ’Waterman’ dragged her mooring onto ’Cleo’s Angel’ whose crew paid out more cable to free her, then weighed and anchored further upwind.  The spectacle was much improved by the blonde child on Waterman being so perturbed by her parents’ behaviour, she dashed below to don a lifejacket.  Though shoulder high to her mother, that’s all she felt necessary to wear, even when bunch turned up to attend the emergency.  The mooring stopped dragging and they sat on it most of the day, in its new position, before finally anchoring.

Hereafter, the term ‘bunch’ will refer to the inhabitants of the Caribbean, regardless of pigmentation, after the words of the song, ‘Six foot, seven foot, eight foot bunch.’  As an aside, I noticed that the Caucasian populace in Trinidad, descendents of plantation owners and such, maintained a very fair countenance, even those who enjoyed boating and the outdoors.

The bunch in the French departments hereabouts, Martinique and French Guyana and maybe also Guadaloupe, have recently rejected independence in referendi.  Something of a political novelty,  but quite understandable given the huge French subsidies and the dire threat of local rule by bunch.

March 2010 - I read about the recent storms, the bad one in Madeira and then the Atlantic coast of France.  I think over on this side the weather is typical but it has been very dry in Carriacou.  Their water catching systems are dry and they're bringing water over from Grenada.  I'm glad to be desalinating as I type.
 
Yesterday, here in Tyrrel Bay, the French staged an exhibition in picking up a fixed mooring with a Hanse 53 sloop, in a moderate breeze.

The female crew was stationed below, near the stove. The other two were put on the bow, equipped with a two-part extendable boat hook and a rope. The first pass was a simple miss. On the second pass the eye on the mooring was hooked, but the boathook fell apart on trying to lift the mooring to tie on.

This initially led to some confusion until the guilt ridden boathook man raced to the stern and dived in after the lost piece. On hearing the splash and the shouting, the female crew, by now feeling dizzy from all the circling, came up on deck.

On the third attempt all was now in place, the shortest crew member, with the least hair, was now at the mooring, treading water. The most self assured crew was on the bow wearing red, heavy duty gardening gloves and the cook was standing by to assist. The 3rd approach was made, a line thrown from the bow and tied on by the man in the water and then made off on a cleat.

Perfect, French text book procedure and no one was even injured.  Hilarious.