We managed 120 miles in the last 24 hours, and all of it sailing. But its hard work as I've mentioned before. The difficulty about having the wind behind is the ever present risk of an uncontrolled gybe. That's when the boat changes its angle to the wind such that the wind can suddenly "see" the other side of the sail, and the sail is then thrust across to the other side of the boat with an almighty bang which can not only damage fittings, but kill people whose heads are in the way. So going down wind you are constantly checking where the wind is in relation to the sail and steering to lessen the chance of an accidental gybe - in fact you don't usually go exactly straight downwind you tend to angle the boat a little one way or the other. Compounding the difficulty of going down wind is the wild rolling of the boat from side to side and often also the pushing of the following swell, making the boat veer one way or the other. A windvane finds this all difficult and consequently we have had three uncontrolled gybes the first of which ripped a fitting out of the bottom of the boom. This fitting is where the Gybe Easy and Vang are attached to the boom and suddenly they were gone - well at least they were no longer attached to the boom and helping to control it - and this is in quite big seas and wind up to 23 knots. So I clipped on and went forward staying very well clear of the boom and found the bit that had been ripped away - a bolt had been snapped and the fitting pulled out of a groove on the underside of the boom. Among my spares I found a perfect fit replacement bolt and after using my Vise Grips managed to get the stump of the broken one out and reattached the fitting to the boom and all was well again. Might not sound like much but it was another one of those panicky crisis moments when you think "Shit, here we go..." And I suppose one just gets out there and tries to sort it out - and its a nice feeling afterwards to have retrieved the situation.
I had the headsail only half rolled out for most of the day as it was too much sail otherwise and the boat was being stressed unnecessarily, but with it half rolled up, things settled nicely. Eventually though I put it away altogether as the seas got bigger and the rolling got worse and worse so the headsail was flopping in and out and banging and flapping every third wave. So now we are just running with the headsail, still close to 6 knots most of the time, still rolling like blazes, but hey this is sailing!
Actually its been magnificent today.
My only other problem has been the Three Kings Islands. They're a little cluster of uninhabited - well, islands - about 30 miles off Cape Reinga and the most comfortable course in these conditions puts me right through the middle of them. So I've been trying to decide how to get round them - they're still 50 miles away - but passing either to their north or to their south poses some issues for me. If I set a course to pass south, I know I'll get more accidental gybes and I don't want that. If I aim to pass to their north I'll have a much less comfortable ride for
the next 6 hours or so because we'll be sailing parrallel to the swells, so rolling side to side even more, plus there's some nasty looking shallow bits that way that I would have to stand well clear of as well. What Ive decided to do is go south as much as possible but as we approach the islands, say when I'm 5 miles off, I will hand steer for a few hours more directly south and make sure we don't have accidental gybes, and make sure we miss the Islands. They're are a Protected Nature Reserve and no one is allowed to land there without a special permit.
I expect I'll be clearing them in the early hours, then passing Cape Reinga and North Cape then heading down the eastern side of Northland to the Bay of Islands - Monday still looks good.
Sapphire Out
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