Good Times, Bad Times, you know I've had my share.....

Quote from crew member (slightly edited for the family version):  anyone who chooses to go offshore for pleasure will go to hades for vacation.   

Okay, it was not so bad.  There was weather.  A lot of it.  There was boat damage.  A fair dinkum.  When we got to the Bitter End (Yacht Club), we discovered we were not alone.  Our two Toronto Hanse compatriots had a very similar experience.  Happy Chaos ended up hand steering for a little less than we did, the last 500 miles, and Unknown Island’s rudder post got bent, even though they were sailing on their third reef point all the time. Yo, Peter and Amanda:  way to rock that third  reef! People in very heavy boats got beat up too.  Turns out there is frigging in the rigging when a boat has to sustain winds of 25 knots with gusts beyond for days at a time.  There were two boats that got towed back to Hampton at the outset, and there was person with a broken arm who needed rescue, There were two boats without engines (heat exchanger, and alternator, that was us),  And there were boats that diverted to Bermuda and have yet to arrive here, as they waited for several days for a weather window.  

Pat Sturgeon, our illustrious and esteemed yacht broker will appreciate this part:  no heat exchanger guy arrives at Virgin Gorda at about the same time as we do.  He calls and asks for assistance into the harbour.  Two Salty Dawgs get their dinghys out and do the deed. While the first mate is supposed to be sleeping, the decision was made to wait out the windless night outside the channel in the Atlantic.  There is sound reasoning:  one never wants to enter an unknown harbour at night, especially when the engine is toast. First mate suggests we inquire about a tow and is turned down ”Tow Boat USA does not work here”, protestations from the first mate to no avail, hence, no radio inquiry occurred.  She likes to ask for options, admittedly, not sufficiently for your taste, Pat.  The first mate is trying to learn the captain.   

This same day, when it is clear we are not going to make it to land and electricity, the first mate decides we should eat as much from the freezer as possible, as it could not be saved.  So we try a BBQ in the doldrums, but could not keep the flame alight.  The Capt’n has a good grooved pan down below, it was nice to eat a meal off a plate.  Off shore, you use a bowl, and it is a little like prison.  I made it, it is hot, now eat it now, for I might not have the wherewithal to do it later.

Sated, with steak and shrimp, potatoes and sauted cabbage, carrots, onion and garlic,  the first mate asks “should we download the weather report?”, and was told, no point, because it is not going to change our decision.  Named storm sets in during the night.  More about this later, I am telling the ending before the intro. Okay, can’t leave it at this.  Turns out the Captain and First Mate slept through this, after first mate asked if there was anyway Cap’n could get a bit of a nights sleep in preparation for a big day of landing the boat and landing us all with immigration and seeing to getting the alternator fixed.  The crew came through beyond all expectations or hope, and volunteered to take his midnight to 6 am shift.  But it wasn’t in the deal for them to really take one for the team like they did!   5 hours of terrific winds and seas.   Daylight come, and you wanna go home. Volver is fighting to windward for two hours after the crew got blown away in 35 knot winds in the night, Volver came into the channel with mainsail up, engine on, because we figured we had 20 minutes of engine time; she was smelling like burning rubber, but we landed, Gratefully, but not gracefully.  And there were boats hailing us after hearing over the radio that we had engine problems, and they were offering us assistance.  The people who work with the first mate knows one of her favorite sayings is:  you will never get what you want unless you ask for it.  What she really wanted on the Sunday was a tow.  There is a culture of self-sufficiency in the sailing world that can bite your bum if you let it.  We are connected, that is why we joined a rally, so we are not alone!  I hope we can learn from this experience.  

Before we tell you more about the journey, the first mate must apologize to everyone who was rightfully expecting our SPOT tracking function to work, so our position would show up on the salty dawg website.  There was a lot of time spent in Barnes and Noble using their nice WIFI and we paid for six months of tracking, signed up, etc.  The cap’n thinks there may be a button on the actual device that needs to be punched to activate the service.  We were able to include a number of people in a daily “I’m okay” message, which sent our latitude and longitude.  Anders emailed that he was following daily on google maps!  He is such a techie!

Our adventure truly began on September 26, the penultimate day of the first mates work schedule, when we discovered that the Erie canal would be closed, and there was a high likelihood that we would be stuck for two weeks waiting for a lock repair.  There was despair, a knashing of teeth, and many machinations of how to overcome this problem were contemplated prior to deciding to ship the boat from Port Credit to Annapolis.   The American shipping company we planned to hire to ship our mast through the canal suggested Annapolis as a possibility, and the first mate thought this was so awesome, as we could attend the Annapolis boat show.  The nice people in America wanted our boat to be one foot shorter than it is, and they kindly agreed to let us out of our contract when we realized that short of cutting some lead off the keel (turns out we really needed this later), we could not comply!

So, we set about completely disassembling everything we had just assembled:  new arch, railings, solar panels, chartplotter, plus things that have been on the boat since she was an infant:  bimini  and dodger frames:  everything in the boat.  We had to limbo to get a clean pair of small things, and could not live there.  We’d moved out of our house by this time and we were able to overstay our welcome at Charles and Petty's home and we are truly grateful for their hospitality, during this time!  

Steve preparing to drive Volver on her long journey to Annapolis

Arrived in Annapolis on Wednesday October 9 and the boat was off the truck by 8 am, the mast rigged and stepped by 1 pm, the arch lifted up by 2, and installed by 3.  The boat yard was so competent:  they were launching many boats that were headed for the boat show the next day. Kudos to Bert Jabins, they are highly recommended!

Then it rained for 5 days, we forged on, sails up and mess contained then abated (we met Julie in Hampton who said, we call it, out boat vomits!  Yes, where does all that stuff go when the boat is tidy?).  We got to the boat show on the Sunday, and contained our spending, eventually headed for the Chesapeake, where we spent 10 days cruising and relaxing before arriving in Hampton on the 25, for another marathon session of getting ready.  We attended a few Salty Dawg seminars and workshops, albeit fewer than we would have liked, as we had such a long list of things to accomplish.  Our crew arrived on November 2nd and were instrumental in the readying process.  Off the plane, to the Home Despot, built a box to contain the new freezer, decommissioned the dinghy, etc.  We were ready to leave when the time came.  We left Hampton on November 6, two days after the planned departure, at the recommendation of weather guru Chris Parker, in order to try and miss the better part of the weather front.

Day 1:  leave the dock, pleasant sail for 10 miles until we ran into Navy vessels on either side of us telling us to stay clear, then the wind died and we started to motor.  The first mate was sea sick, but she always is and she knew that the nature of the beast is that no one stays sea sick for longer than 3 days.   She pre-medicated, and prepared to suck it up.  Someone heated up one of the meals the first mate cooked and froze this night, but no one seemed to have much appetite.  We started our watch system, and started trying to catch sleep when possible.

Day 2:  We hit the weather front we were expecting, with winds of 20-30 knots, forward of the beam, so our bow was banging in to the waves.  We were punching through the gulf stream by now too, so we had a north going current and there were two sets of confused waves.  Kinda like sailing through lake Ontario:  very choppy seas.  Everyone was quite sea sick, apart from hale and hearty Charles, who came down to the nav station during the first mates “sleep break” and discovered the floor boards were floating!  No, they are screwed down, but we were filling up with water.  From the anchor locker, into our V-Berth/sleeping quarters, into the bilge.  There are bilge pumps.  They did not activate.  After manually activating a switch, yes, a very small pump turned on.  The key to our success was a hand operated bilge pump and a bucket.  It was a three person operation, with another person at the helm.  Just the first of several all hands on deck days!  There was no log entry for this day.  We did not make a meal or eat beyond power bars.  I made a joke at the outset of the trip:  “we could make it the the BVI on power bars alone.”  I expected a large supply to be left at the end.  I was wrong.  

We had a fair amount of motoring at the beginning of the trip, once because the winds were too high (and the first mate believes we were all learning how to sail the boat at sustained high speeds, so were a bit leary of turning into the winds now that they were behind us instead of in front of us, and putting up the sail.  Once we mastered those constant 25 knot winds, it was a matter of finesse, but mostly, it was a matter of less is more:  reef, lose very little boat speed, and enjoy your ride more.   

Charles and the first mate agreed to count Saturday as our second to last day, as we clearly should have landed in virgin gorda on Sunday at 3 if the wind was on our side.  This night, he tells her, a little after dark, as the full moon was ascending:  

You know, if I was sitting in a bar and some old codger came up to me and told me that he was sailing in 23 knots of wind with a triple reef and a doubly reefed jib doing hull speed, I would tell that guy he is FOS!  The first mate told Charles, “now you are that old guy with the story!”

The days all run into each other.  We had a lot of motoring at the beginning of the trip, and we were starting to worry about our fuel supply.   We decided not to turn into Bermuda, for we were confident we were going to hit wind soon.  We had a calm day and dumped Jerry Cans 4 and 5 out of a total of 6 (5 gallons each) into the tank, keeping one in reserve.  The Cap’n was prescient when he declared:  this is the amount of fuel we will head into the harbour with!  Unfortunately he was correct, as we were soon to lose our engine!

Sadly, adding the last of the fuel at sea during a calm

It was around this time that we had the doldrums, and ended up doing a lot of the definition of cruising:  boat repairs in exotic places.  One of the crew had the singular experience of being hoisted up the mast in the middle of the Atlantic.  The first mate offered (twice!) but was turned down.  Those are good bragging rights!  

Our goal was to get east enough to catch the tradewinds, which are coming from the northeast at this time of year, and should have just pushed us down to the BVIs.  But we had the weather reports from Chris Parker.  Captain:  “Chris, your weather reports were terrible.  They were accurate, but terrible”.  Always:   get thee south, beyond 30, then beyond 28, then beyond 26 degrees latitude.  Dude, we can’t move that fast at hull speed!  So we knew we were going to catch a front.  I didn’t mind this second to last one:  winds behind our back, expecting it, but we sustained a lot of damage.  

The worst of it happened at the beginning of what turned out to be a 3 day front.  The first mate was at the helm, auto was driving, and the wind shifted quite a bit in short order, and although the auto helm is capable of steering to the wind, no one knows how to set it to do so.  The first mate typically sails to the wind on the instrument, and was able to get auto to behave, and to convince the crew that the jib was extraneous when our wind speed was 27 behind our back and our boat speed was 9.2, far above our theoretical hull speed of 7.7.   We got the boat tamed, but not the wind.  As the first mate went down the companionway at midnight, she smelled burning rubber and reported same to the cap’n.  Why was the engine on?  We were prob. Trying to charge the batteries, which had been very wonky the whole trip.   The engine was turned off.  First mate went to “sleep”.   

3  AM:  Charles wakes up, chats with the cap’n and starts to investigate the source of the smell.  He thinks there is a bearing in the alternator that is gone.  Full cabin lights on.  The first mate is allegedly still sleeping in the salon, with her head just below the snack cupboard (aside:  planning bad.  She did ask for a 10 minute head to wind to switch the snack and baking cupboards but we never had 10 minutes to spare.  The arrangement has nothing to recommend it).  

0345: “ I need some help up here”

Flurry of activity is heard from the salon settee/sleeping quarters.

“We’ve lost the mainsheet!”  Oh no!, enough of this pretending to sleep sh*t, we’ve had an accidental gybe.  As anyone in medicine knows, the worst sh*t always happens in the middle of the night, and at shift change.  No duh, same old, same old, we are just not in a hospital.  In a near gale force wind, yes, whatever.  We are getting used to it now.  The first mate is beyond grateful that Charles and the Cap’n were always harnessed in on the foredeck and especially this night!  We lost our boom vang, tackle from the main sheet, and the travellor, and the main sheet itself cleaved in two.   Charles and the Captain jury rigged the boom and travellor so the main could sail.  Good thing the first mate won a raffle in Hampton for a new main sheet: we didn’t think it was needed, but we’ll take it!  

0415:  "okay, boys, lets raise the main!"  First mate: "let me ask a question.  Do we need to?"  Crew:  we are sailing our course and making 6.8 knots (on jib alone).  First mate:  can we please do this until day break until we have the opportunity to do a daylight inspection?  Crew: yes.  We proceeded to sail for 2 days on jib alone.

So here is where the fun begins.  We have no engine.  Our main is crippled.  There is no sun.  Our solar panels are jewellery, no, they are a little bit  functional,  We are able to charge our nav lights and instruments.  Don’t even think of using autohelm or chartplotter.  AIS?  Who needs a computer to tell you if there are boats nearby?  Look around, do you see any?  Turns out no, not for days at a time.   Hand steering begins.  Fridge and freezer full of entire season of food is turned off.  Tough slogging, but the wind is at our backs.  Truly, this was a mostly fun but demanding part of the journey.  It was consistently 25 knots.  Can you cook in that?  Can you even just heat up food?  I guess you can.  My crew want to drill a cooking harness right into the middle of the cupboards to keep people steady on port tack.  First mate says no to anything that will destroy the joinery. But the more dangerous direction is starboard tack, as you are being thrown onto the flames as your food is cooking. We had opportunity to use the fireproof apron Petty kindly made for the journey.  

For three days we sail on the same tack, mostly on jib alone.  We have every expectation that we will be in on Sunday , which would be 11days and a few hours.  We were 24 hours beyond, most of which was spent circling, like a plane in a holding pattern.   Sadly, in the midst of a storm brewing.  You know the ending to this story!

Volver Sails Herself

Good times:  the first mate enjoyed the six to nine shifts, spent with Charles.  Sunrise and coffee in the morning, discussions about math, never moving to actually get a calculator and use Pythagorus’s theorem to solve the problem of the hypotenuse (we had each days latitude and longitude in our log book). Later enjoyed sunset and tea with Charles and the Cap’n in the evening.

The Sunrise Shift!

The Captain recalls his best day as the one where we sailed the gennaker.  The six to nine shift enjoyed motoring through the clear morning, through glass-like seas.  Our sole dolphin siteing occurred:  they were not the Flipper-esce dolphins  seen in the Chesapeake, but dark blue with hazel markings.  We were expecting 10-20 knot winds that day.  Before they built, we hoisted and sailed the asymmetrical headsail.  By the second six to nine shift, we were sailing with a double reef in the mail and full jib.

Sailing the Gennaker in the Atlantic

The boys seemed to enjoy their time in the midday together.  Scatological humour was employed.  They high fived each other when the first mate remarked that collectively, they seemed to regress to a mental age of 12:  they were thinking 8, but the first mate thought they were more interested in sex than the average eight year old.

Good times:  Unknown Island left behind a Blue Performance hatch cover.  Volver's crew picked up a set of tent poles in the Hampton Bass Pro (welcome, fishers, hunters, and other liars:  they should add sailors) store.  In the middle of the Atlantic, someone fell onto one of the dodger windows, more than once, knocking it out.  For one night, mother nature was letting us really know who is boss, sending heaving waves into the cockpit.  During the night, while actively engaged in usual not sleeping behavior, the first mate thinks to use the hatch cover over the open space where lexan should be.  This is after trying to use an inverter and the sewing machine, which will sew fabric, after being repaired, but will not sew lexan.  We called this the "eye patch."  Many days later, there was some debate by the 12 year olds, while the first mate was allegedly sleeping about whether or not we should sail into the harbour with the "eye Patch" on.  The boy's consensus was overheard and was definitely NOT!  The first mate protested, citing ingenuity at sea and tales of survival as reasons to enter the harbor with pride and an eye patch!  After all, we had no engine.  Charles replied that the condition of the first mates hair was a firm assertion of the powerful will to survive (it might have stood up like heavily pomaded hair of the 80's on it's own accord!). At the time of entry to the harbour, there was no question of pride, not thought of the "eye patch:"  the crew was bedraggled and humblebe.  Today, Volver took the eye patch off and turned it into a hatch cover.  Good times.

The "Eye Patch"

Useful and Intended Purpose:  the Hatch Cover

Bad times:  you are kidding me that I tried to hook up to an inverter tonight via an extension cord that does not work because of salt water.   You are kidding me that all the new locks we bought are rusting.  Stainless steel stanchions and the leg of our table inside the boat are rusting.  

Good times:  I’m in the BVIs, sitting in a beautiful anchorage, at night, typing in warm breezes, with a tidy boat, which is also mostly clean!  There is a live band upwind at the beach bar, and the music is good!  The moldy laundry has been washed and foul weather gear and lifejackets are stowed away.  There are hammocks, a pool, and lounge chairs with cushions waiting for us on shore today.  There was a guy in our boat changing our alternator within 15 minutes of docking.  We haven’t paid him yet, but he hasn’t finished:  there is still a jumbie in the tachometer causing it to jump around rather than giving a meaningful reading.  The captain is pretty sure it is not actually charging the batteries.  We can stay on this same mooring ball for free, enjoying the amenities of the resort until December 22.  

North Sound, Virgin Gorda

Bad times:  we took the ferry to the “supermarket” yesterday and came home with rum and ginger beer, a 24 of beer, some cheese and eggs.  The cap’n reminds the first mate that she previously acknowledged she might have to start eating chicken vs. eating tinned tuna.  There is no fresh meat, and the only frozen fish was freezer burned shrimp and kingfish (only Petty can make that taste good), and the produce is awful.  Get used to it, he says.  We may have to make an unscheduled return to the US:  St. Thomas has a costco, and the first mate imagines this will be a good place to restock the freezer for the winter!

Good times:  The cap’n took some super thin flatbreads we had, went to the larder, and came up with a delicious pizza for dinner.  There is enormous potential for creative cuisine in our future!  

Well, this blog entry is officially longer than most essays the first mate composed for Uni. Later