GAS.

AT SEA
31°48'30"N
013°10'30"W
26.08.08
1545 UTC
S/Y SAFARI
____________________________________________

seas are slightly 'lumpy', as russ might say. due to an underwater obstacle, a 'sea mountain,' the existence of which i'd not before been aware. this one is sort of between Gibraltar Strait and the Canary Islands, therefore i have likely experienced it before, though i was unaware of the geography at the time. i suppose it is a style thing, where this skipper chats more about the sea features, and what´s underneath us. the business of sailing is indeed our primary distraction.

thinking a lot about the lake today. about how amusing it is that as soon as i get back from sailing i want to go to the lake. it /is/ what i actually want to do. and it almost doesn't matter which lake, but i have a sneaking suspicion it'd be lake of the woods. as it is quite spectacular in october, based on my experiences last fall. and other falls. thinking about the magnificent sevens, playing the banjo, roots jam, being allowed to work again and earn money, sitting in a canoe and not worrying about not earing money. the cross-country ski cabin courtney's folks mentioned, building the shilling, playing more mandolin. even... gasp, playing an / my electric guitar. i did manage to do some of that while in antigua. i somehow snaked on to play 'johnny b. goode'with the itchy feet variety show and cover band in dickenson bay during one of the many antigua race week celebrations. hindsight says i'd have enjoyed matthew's birfday BBQ more than the race week event. but there was no way to know that in advance. i didn't make the mistake of putting paddy's band that high on my priority list again. full cheese. some of the fun and most of what i do not miss in the least about the business of music. the music of music, as that lovely violist / violinist with the terribly beautiful hands described it, still appeals. the cycles of expectation and disappointment; the crowd pleasing vs. the creative. feeding the ego / truth and beauty.



this is the interior of s/y safari. neat, huh?

i'm quite hoping to hear back from antigua when i arrive in the canaries, a week or so there before the next whatever it is would be probably quite relaxing and regenerative. i'm a little concerned that it might be 10° or so hotter but so it goes, hey? i might even look up paddy's band. i would totally look up paddy's little band.

saw a sea turtle. and some dolphins, but that's almost in the notthing-to-write-home-about category. they're even called 'common dolphin.' somehow i had not seen a sea turtle before yesterday though. it was sort of brown. the colour of wheat in august. i saw it out of the corner of my eye. wondered if it was cardboard or something yukky. just under the water's surface. it lifted up a fin and waved as our boat went past.

*anthropmorhism note:

not really. our turtle was far more likely to be randomly swimming than greeting or saluting. even the dolphins, i imagine are not actually communicating with /us/ up there on the binnacle. if anything, they're around ever so briefly to find out that our twin 44' hulls are inanimate and then they normally quite promptly leave. sometimes play around for 30 seconds or so in our bow wave. but generally not long. it's sort of like the thing where people think the baby is smiling at them, and then the mom says:
it's just gas.

: :

AT SEA
30°27'00"N
010°55'30"W
24.08.08
1050 UTC
S/Y Safari
______________________________________

Another beautiful morning. still heading 218°, doing near 7 knots now. this is considered good, or at least better than average for this leg. running about 80% genoa, wind is constant on our starboard quarter, and has been so ever since we left cascais. a mostly good rest stop, though very little actual rest. it was some scrub-a-scrub and the usual routine i am tempted to say. went up the rig again and promptly sliced into my index finger with a party knife. whoops. blood spilled on deck. two or three choice drips from 70 feet up look pretty nice on the shiny clean white deck. indeed thicker than water.

made 15.8 knots yesterday. with 3 reefs in the main, and about 50% genoa out. woo hoo! mostly we're not in any evident rush. so when we are doing better than 6 knots or so, skipper is content. in some ways, not having the main up actually allows for better sailing, and certainly more flexibility. with no main, gybing is not an issue at all. and then with the main up, it seems like we do better, SOG wise.

it'd be a whole different story if we had a delivery spinnaker or even a gennaker. teri agrees and has a good line on one for the other end.

also, she has suggested that i'd be able to quickly get a cooking gig in the USVI when this is all done. an interesting thesis. one which would involve shaving! i actually never put any cooking of any sort on my first sailing resume. for some reason. i suppose i thought it was merely one of those bonus skills that everyone sort of has. not something really worth mentioning or marketing. and then, it becomes apparent that not everyone can or will bake bread or cookies. that there are people (bless 'em) who really do want the gorgonzola and the havarti to come out when the words 'grilled cheese' are in the same sentence. people who abhor macaroni, and actually enjoy salad.

still, i am not in much of a rush to chain myself to a gimbled oven. we'll see what happens on the other end. i am not less a fan of finding out what opportunity has to say when it finally shows up. half the trouble is recognizing the opportunity when it arises. thinking brifly about in the açores coffee place the day when my favourite deckhand asked what i was up to that afternoon and mentioned that it was a good day for a walk around the caldiera. i agreed and made idle chatter. then she finished her cappuccino and went away. how about: nice oops. file under: ron is a moron.

maybe i should be a cook. whatever keeps a person afloat, hey?

random.

AT SEA
35°36.1'N
011°23.6'W
1000 GMT+1
23.08.08
s/y safari
_____________________


random gear inventory

• plastimo iris 50 - hand bearing compass
  
• weems & plath - extra hand bearing compass
  
• plastimo offshore 105 nautical compass
  
• raymarine smart pilot
  
• raymarine st70 x2
  
• raymarine ray240vhf
  

*though plastimo has or seems to have a rep of being more like the k-tel of the yachting world, i actually much prefer the plastimo hand bearing compass to the weems & plath. the glowy in the dark stuff glows longer, the numbers are easier to read in low light conditions and there's a needle in the bearing window that enables a more accurate reading. hm.

*the raymarine vhf is the nicest vhf i have yet encountered. elegant. functional. not quite a bang & olufsen, but still very nice.

rats! actually no rats. just flotsam.

AT SEA
39°22'00"N
009°32'30"W
1335 GMT+1
21.08.08
s/y safari
_____________________

Danger: Remember to disconnect the shore power supply before casting off.


yep. another idyllic day of motoring. note the sarcasm?
the motoring watches provide less entertainment and more time spent idle. not a problem, on the one hand. cascais is imminent. we'll arrice tonight around midnight and anchor until morning at qwhich point we shall likelt head into a berth in the marina. i am starting to think it's not the case that water is water no matter where you are sailing. and though this contract is better than the last one, i admit to some frustration with not actually setting out for more than a month for my actual or perhaps theoretical destination.

today is the last full day of camp s 2008. while i have certainly been busy and mostly fulfilled, i am certainly missing the place. i think it started in july in dorest, when i realized i'd rather have been in ontario than bridport one morning. up until then i was pretty pleased with everything. and then this delivery came up. suggesting that i would be landing in MID august in annapolis, now known in my head as 'naptown' which is a great nickname, i think. i jumped at this. and then sat on my hands for 16 days in the expensive resort town, with essentially no money, having spent it on gear for the trip, and a plane ticket to france. less fun. more drag.

i am fully ready to get going. no days off, thank you very much. days off are for when you have earned money. when you are broke, you work. and when you're not allowed to work, go someplace you can work. one can only scheme and plan the distant future for so long. so long as it remains distant.

the monocromatic visual field experiment
yesterday evening while on an otherwise uneventful becalmed motoring watch, i espied a yellow flotasm (jetsam?)... floaty thing. certainly about the size of /your/ head, perhaps slightly bigger. it was about 8:21. i watched it at first bobbling alongside and then past our boat, and turned my head to admire its passage. noting the time, 8:23, i opened the binocs to try and see how long it'd remain in view. keeping in mind, this thing was also bright yellow. we wree doing not much better than 5.5 knots SOG (Speed Over Ground). i made every effort to keep the darned thing in sight, and the sea state was moderate, on the slight side. we have waves, and we have swell. sometimes the waves are going the same direction as the swell, sometimes not. and then there is tide. but that's a whole nother story. i sighted our yellow floater thingy and marked the time ay 827. the 'notify the watch relief'alarm went at 830 and i stayed on the lookout for several more minutes. on this trip, watch relief gets a wakeup call, one of russ' conventions. i was in the midst of my little expriment so i dragged my feet. teri likes a bit more lead time than russ' normal 10 minutes. .


a lesson: do no look at the time. do not look anywhere other than at or for the floaty thingy in question. other people can look at the time. rereading the handwritten journal, i am alerted that i did look away at least two times between 8:21 and 8:33, to look at the time and to shut off the alarm. if it /really/ mattered, than that's two times i would consider i'd not want to have looked away.

so. the brightly coloured floating object in daylight in moderate / slight seas was visible for no more than 4 minutes aft of the boat, moving only at 5.5 knots. informative, no? i think one of the very last things my dad said to me when i was about to leave winnipeg was 'don't fall off the boat.' yep. apparently in iceland and norway, each family has its own design of warm wooly (fishing) sweater, sort of like the scots tartan. that way those fishing who might be separated from their boat might be more easily identified if ever eventually washed ashore or found adrift. ooo! morbid!

less delivering. more floating.

AT ANCHOR
S/Y Safari
43°40.581'N
007°36.168'W
2200 UTC+1
18.08.08
_______________________________
In order to share as much new technology, new equipment and new materials with you as possible, our boats are constantly improved. This is why the specifications and information given are not contractual and can be modified without notice and we are not obliged to provide updates. - lagoon 440 manual


it has been decided that getting around the corner would simply not be cost effective. what with the price of diesel and all. 5 L an hour to burn for 20 hours making only 3 knots. no good. weighed against staying in a marina, russ decided to go for the marina, which turned out to be full. so i have learned some about setting an anchor and using the windlass. that sort of thing. i am now on my third anchor watch - actually rather uneventful, which is the way we like anchor watch to be, and have had a relaxing day. yet a relaxing day with less rest in it if that makes any sense. without the business of sailing to keep everyone distracted, everyone was underfoot all day. russ ducked out of making lunch. not really a problem, but it did break things up less. and make the galley a busier place longer. no problem.

so once again, i am in spain. but not really. no actual going ashore. no boots of spanish leather. no sea of carrots. no fresh bread!

went up the rig this afternoon. a big advantage on this smaller crew is that whatever there is to get done, i am the one often doing it if the skipper doesn't want to for anyreason whatsoever. not terrible. russ does skipper's share of the work, but as far as far as going up the rig today goes. i get to do it. of course when i got into the bosun chair, there were suddenly 20 knot winds and drizzly fun to contend with. but a mission hopefully mostly accomplished. my goal, besides a rig check, was to secure the radar reflector, held until now since recently by good luck and a wee spot of duct tape. i plastered more of each on up there and made efforts to secure the bits with some cable tie. used up all the cable tie. used up the last of the duct tape. fingers crossing. it should last we hope until cascais, when we get more of all of the above.

also today, a seminar on buys-ballot's law, dangerous / navigable sectors of tropical revolving storms and good stuff like that.

complain. complain. all i ever do is complain,

AT SEA
S/Y Safari
43°36'30"N
006°13'30"W
1100 UTC+1
17.08.08



Although everything possible has been designed and planned with the safety of the boat and its users in mind, remember that sailing is highly dependent on the weather conditions of the sea, and that only an experienced and fit crew, handling a well maintained boat, can sail satisfactorily.
- lagoon 440 manual



having said all that about the fork business. i struck a fork into a not baked boiled enough potato and crumpled two of the tines. flim-sy.

alas. since i am not buying the flatware, i can't complain, can i?

watch today has been entertaining, since i started standing watch, the star of the show has got to be this three-masted schooner. a tall ship, square-rigger. it was a wee speck against the french coast (or is it spain? i should check) and it has been a most lovely sight in the meantime. one by one the sails have come out. it's nearly in full sail now. first, a sail in the center mast, in the middle, now, a mizzen mast mainsail. might be called a bermuda. the anatomy of a tall ship is a bit out of my experience. perhaps one day.

we're considered a bermuda rig. mainsail and foresail. ours is called a Genoa, which is i gather a region of italy where someone invented the sail. or whoever decided it should be called that was from there (or something). i am thinking the Solent sail is called that because the innovation came from shipwrights there. similarly the Bimini and so on. occasionally russ called our foresail a 'yankee,' but it seems no so much since we acquired the american woman who owns a piece of the boat.

teri has an iridium sat phone and can use it to get weather information. which we like. she calls MacDonalds the 'american embassy.' which she likes. the iridium connection is actually pretty cost effective; not yet convinced i'd indulge, but she says it works great with a send /receive function. some of what i have been after, i think, is the phenomenon of 'unplugging,'
as leighana says. on the one hand, if i am going to be at sea, then i should oughta just be at seas sometimes. hey?


oh yeah! another lunar eclipse of the full moon while at sea. though partial and clouded over for a good portion of the event.

safari

AT SEA
S/Y Safari
45°22'45"N
004°54'15"W
1200 UTC+1
16.08.08
_________________________


Read this manual carefully before you put to sea so that you can make the most of her [i.e. the boat ~ ed. note] and avoid any damage and difficulties.
- lagoon 440 manual


whew! nice to be on passage again (finally). just getting settled briefly before lunch - a short pretend-nap, not so much an actual nap, but no worries. happy days, hey?

lost one of our instrument panels, regrettably. the one below decks, by our nav table.

lost a furling line, when it jammed its sorry self between a pulley wheel and its housing (or 'cage').
the boat comes from the factory with this covery thing that regrettably effectively obscures the view of the furling line skipping out of place. so now it's bare spectra, the sheath has been fully pulled off. the fellows in carriacou would say 'that will be not a problem' and continue to sail on it. the strength of the rope is in the core, not the sheath so they are mostly right. but the feeling of taking an unnecessary risk would tend to not leave me at least. and, seeing as we're not in carriacou, the sacrifice furling is being replaced with the factory furling line. one thing that happens with this delivery contract is that the lines are all replaced with cheaper, shittier lines for the ocean crossing. which is extra good, because when we're in 4000m of water and 1000 km from land in any direction, something breaks we have a replacement. (several replacements!)

and at the moment we're headed for france. are we supposed to be headed for france?

sail	area in square metres
full main	71.30 m2
first reef	59.10 m2
second reef	44.20 m2
third reef	29.46 m2

no. we're headed /from/ france, around cape finisterre - the so-called 'cape of death.' we're reached the blue part. just off the edge of the continental shelf and into the deep water. finisterre takes us down the coast of spain toward... cascais. it's not a dread thing; yet i think i might be just fine without seeing the sights again. they're fine and i know at least where everything mostly is.

a funny thing about this current crop of sailors, since we left (or should i say, since i left the caribbean, it seems like there are no 'young' people sailing. the demographic includes an large number of early retirees and a few under-40s, even fewer under-30s. i suppose, unless you're working in the luxury yacht i.e. service industry, you'd be either a delivery captain / crew or necessarily independently wealthy to be sailing up and down the spanish coast.

on this delivery, one of the owners is aboard, actually interesting in a way. i have heard that there's a rule about doing deliveries with the owner aboard. teri works hard, has sailing skills, and a great attitude. she's here to learn about the process and about the boat. this is her first atlantic crossing. a graet thing. we're still a crew of three so it's myself, russ and teri. chris went off to açores to do a delivery to ft. lauderdale. looks to me like i wouldn't be able to get back to canada before october at the very earliest, sort of defeating the purpose - if the purpose was to get to the SJR job teaching canoeing in pinawa bay at the end of sept. we'll see how things go on the next leg, but so far no delivery i know of has been early.

this vessel is a Lagoon 440 catamnaran. two refrigerators, 4 ensuite cabins and two forward berths. there's even airconditioning, but i certweainly don't expect that we'll be using it on delivery. like the 'fruits de mer' boat, the interior is covered in stylish cardboard, indoor/outdoor (grey) carpet and lovely orange plastic tape.

i'm glad-a i brought:

~ a cup. the one i found in the hot water shed(TM) when doing close a few years back.
~ chopsticks. these improve things more than slightly. unlike norm, i don't have a favourite fork, but i do appreciate and prefer a heavy 'nice' one to the flimsy excusese for a fork that we have aboard. i am pleased they're not plastic.

at sea
20.21.00 N
025.35.00 W
1100
s/y safari
12.08.08
___________________________

trouble in paradise. when we do watch handover, usually there's some direction about what our range of preferred course is based on the predictions about weather and wind behaviour. as we do get quite up-to-date data, it's usually pretty safe to predict that our wind will be x knots coming from y degrees until z time. when new conditions may or should apply. local conditions prevail, as they say, and sometimes the weather just doesn't do what anyone behind a desk in some other part of the world thinks it might.

we're on the edge of the range, see, and there's been all this talk of goosewinging, see, and i was even asked point blank if i had any experience with it, and i of course replied, 'a certain amount.' i was given a brief (perhaps superfluous), 'this is how we gybe the headsail' tutorial. no problem. all leading up to what? my directives said that our 'ideal' course was 245° and we'd been having some trouble making 270°. not undoable, but slightly noisy. i elected to go for the wing-on-wing.

not met with approval. after about four minutes, russ came on deck. i was given a royal 'bollocking,' as they say. we're often told that russ is not at his best when he immediately wakes. and usually for about 8 hours after that. this was quite exceptional though. when i assured him that it was not meant to be malicious, he said that he was just 'having a go' and continued to have it. whatever it takes. we immediately undid the goose-wing, went from 248° to about +5 of the maximum of our former range and remained so for the rest of my watch. curiously, we have been goose-winging for most of the rest of today. the problem is that i took too much initiative in the process. no decision-making allowed. maybe wing-on-wing is a bigger deal than i think it is. hm.