We Didn't Make it Very Far

Less than a hundred miles offshore, our first overnight of the four-day (and -night!) sail to the Windward Passage, we experienced unexpectedly bad weather. We entered a trough (which was predicted, with only a passing short squall) that lasted for hours. We had a single reef in our main and about half jib up, and were still sailing at seven knots. The wind was well forward of the beam (much more north-east than east), and the motion on the boat was very confused. After midnight, I made my way forward and put a second reef in the main and rolled up more jib to slow us down some.

About 3 a.m., I was on watch, with my harness and tether on, Larry asleep below decks. A rogue wave hit us broadside, coming up and over the bimini, slamming me against the cockpit lifelines (thank goodness we had installed stainless steel all around the cockpit!). Of course these things never happen during the day. We were hit with such force that the gears on our self-steering unmeshed and suddenly I was steering by hand, buffeted by beam-to waves. Larry was up and leaning over to fix the self-steering. After an hour of this, we determined we couldn't fix it underway and made the decision to turn back.

I got a couple of hours sleep and came up to a steel-grey sky, horizontally-sluicing rain, and perhaps 25 knots of wind, beating into it. We were trying to make it back to Curacao but it was obvious from our track that we wouldn't be able to, that we were headed for Aruba.

Our poor head sail

Once we were able to take stock of the damage and count our bruises and scrapes, we were grateful neither of us was injured badly. Our poor headsail, one of the primary "engines" of our sailboat, was damaged. The blue sun cover was in shreds, and one of the control lines (known as the leech line) was dangling off the trailing edge of the sail. Oh my!






So - here we find ourselves in Aruba, a much windier island to the west of Curacao. We have been seeking a sailmaker to repair our jib, and finally found one who will take a look at it.

Hotel area in the north of the island

Aruba is a very tourist-oriented island, much more so than Curacao. Cruise ships dock every day, and hotels make the island look very much like the coast of south Florida. Marine services for the small boat sailor like ourselves are few and far between.

But - this is where we find ourselves, so we will pursue fixing the boat here!

View from the stern of our boat

We are at the Renaissance Marina, in a protected man-made cove, just past the cruise ship docks. It is interesting to watch the cruise ships come in, with the pilot boats handling their massive dock lines.

Sea Trial, New Lazy Jacks, Self-Steering Problem

Monitor Self-Steering Wind Vane

We have a short delay due to problems found on a sea trial we took on Sunday. The good news: the sails, rig, and engine performed wonderfully. The bad news: we could not get the self-steering to work. On a passage of this length, the wind vane self-steering gear is absolutely essential. When it works, it is brilliant - using only the wind as its energy source, it senses the wind as it comes over the boat, and connects to the tiller, steering the boat on a course we select.

It is not the easiest piece of gear to use on the boat, and we suspect the problem has to do with the gears not meshing properly, and also user error. After all, it has been several years since we have used it.

Rigger Gijs Installing Lazy Jacks

 Last week, we had the local rigger out to our boat to install a system of lines running up the mast called Lazy Jacks. It holds the mainsail in place when we are raising or lowering sails until we can put sail ties around it. It is known as "taming the main sail", and is worth its weight in gold during a sudden squall. That's when we want to drop the mainsail quickly to depower the boat to ride out a storm. In any but the lightest of breezes, the sail can be a handful for the one person on deck making sail changes. We tested it out on Sunday, and it's great to have.

Up the mast with a drill to install the blocks and line

Another pair of boat shoes bites the dust - they've served me well

Last Push Before We Set Sail!

We are targeting Tuesday, January 12 to set sail. Every day is completely filled with last-minute projects, and we are busier than one-armed wallpaper hangers. So far, no show stoppers!

Today's big news is that I made radio contact with our weather router, Chris Parker. All next week looks good. There is a huge low-pressure system centered around Bermuda to the north of us, giving us the best light breezes we have ever seen on Curacao. Too bad one area has to get bad weather to steal our usual strong winds away!

Once we are underway, we'll have no Internet. Other things we will miss right away include the showers and flush toilets here at the marina, having a dock with a water hose and electric hookup right outside our door, daily long walks, and the camaraderie of the cruisers we have met here. More adventures will be in store in Florida, I am sure.

Weather Window

It looks like the weather window we have been waiting for is finally about here! Conditions have been moderating for several days. So we have been tackling our "To-Do" list with a frenzy, working to get ready to leave.

Larry getting ready to dive on the boat's bottom

One of the tasks is to dive down on the boat's bottom, clearing away all of the growth that has made its home attached to our keel. We also need to check the zincs, protective sacrificial metal that protect our boat's metal parts (especially the engine and propeller shaft) from galvanic corrosion. A general view of what's going on down there is also in order - does anything look amiss?

Into the water, scraper in hand

We also need to inspect the anchor and chain. These are just two of the dozens of tasks that are on our list of jobs to finish before we finally give Curacao the old "heave-ho".

Haul out the anchor and inspect the chain

No less daunting is the psychological preparation we are adjusting to - it is a big ocean out there, and we have a small boat. There is no AAA on the water, so we must rely on our own problem-solving to fix all of the things that will break out there, buy all of the necessary stores we will need, and get ready for the rigors of 24/7 watch-keeping. One of the myths about long-distance sailing is that it is romantic and carefree. Larry and I rarely see much of each other in our double-handed boating - one of us is always on watch while the other sleeps. The sleep never seems to be enough before it is time to go back to being on watch. The list of potentially deadly things that can go wrong have been waking me up at night even now - we could be run down by a ship, a weather system could hit us unaware, we could run aground if our navigation is not spot on.

Fortunately we have enough experience to know what to watch out for, and the importance of keeping everything ship-shape on deck.

We hope to be ready to leave by Monday, January 11. It seems like we have been here on the island quite a while already, but it has only been three weeks so far!