Ken Gourlay Circumnavigation - Pt 8

An ill wind

Day 135 was the quiet before the storm. From noon till 2000 hours I actually went backwards two nautical miles. For two days in a row my runs were under 100nm. At 2000 the wind came in with a vengeance from the southeast. The barometer was still high at 1020hPa. It didn't take long for the wind to reach 30kts, gusting to 40 and the seas rose equally. I was getting a very rough ride. The next day it was so rough that I missed sending my email for the first time in the trip.

My email read thus:

I was being forced farther north and loosing all the good progress south that I had made in the previous few days. I was back to sailing with my fantastic hurricane jib. This little 6m², almost bulletproof jib was fantastic. It was so small that you would think it could not drive the boat anywhere. When the winds are in excess of 40kts their power is phenomenal and this little jib is just great. When the wind is 50kts its power is actually double that of 40kts. On a modern designed boat there is no need for a larger sail. I carry another storm jib which is 9m² which was the first one that I bought with the set of sails.

The next day was not much better. As the low passes by, westerly winds are due, so progress east will continue. When you are in a storm like this it is best to accept it, settle down till it's over and then make the appropriate moves. I like to get sleep when I can and keep eating to keep my strength up. You never quite know when you might be needed and when you will get sleep or food next. Mileage to Australia had been hopeless. These easterly storms were not helping. I averaged out the last 14 days and came up with 106nm per day. The last four days had averaged out to 85nm per day. At this rate I would not make the record. Some at home could not understand the slow progress. Although I had accepted that I would not break the record I still found it hard mentally to let it go. I would continually work out what I needed to get home in time. Every slow day added a bit more to lift the average required. My mainsail was in very poor shape now.

SUPERCELL
Following this easterly weather was a huge low-pressure system. I had two days of storm-force winds from the west as I was above the low's centre. I averaged 150nm per day. With my chain sea anchor out to control my speed and the seas so big, I did not wish to see the boat out of control going down the face of one of these waves. There were some huge seas in amongst this weather. I noticed that my ampere meter/counter had stopped working. This is a great little meter that gives me a reading on the amps going in or out of the batteries. It also counts the amps and tells me how many of the 400 held in the batteries I have left. It also tells me the voltage of the batteries. I will have to investigate this problem when the wind settles down as it is important information in the power management of the boat.
 
With this storm came huge amounts of rain, too. This loads the air with moisture and it isn't long till everything in the boat feels moist to touch. After being at sea for so long, salt has had time to impregnate all my clothing and towels. This salt attracts moisture. Everything will have to be dried again and in the Southern Ocean sunny days don't seem to come along that often. Winds were touching 50kts quite regularly and on the second day gusts were touching 70kts. This was near the wind strength of my biggest storm near Cape Horn, but, thankfully, the wave's height and sea state was nowhere near as bad. My chain drogue was great as it seemed to let the boat sail as it is designed to do, but has the resistance to impede it against surfing. If a wave slews the boat off course then the chain seems to slow this action and helps the rudder to straighten her up again. I had packed the hurricane jib away and only had the smallest amount of No. 4 jib out. The main has torn again and it wasn't even up. It was lashed to the boom. This signified the end of that sail. It was time it came off and I bring out my brother's spare mainsail.

I sent home a special email to my family telling them of some of my woes.

AND THERE'S MORE
I pulled off my weather reports as I normally do at that time of day and just stared at them in horror. Another low was building, just as big as the last one right in front of me and the worst part was that it was north of me. This meant that I would be getting easterlies again and very powerful ones at that. 
I just didn't want this. There was no way out of them. I was just too far south of this building weather pattern and the winds were going to blow very strongly.

By the next morning I was already experiencing easterly winds and by lunch they had built and my top gust reached 66kts. I was beginning to love the Indian Ocean.

The new ram was going into overload when it worked too hard so I decided it was time to hove to. I did this by back winding the hurricane jib and lashing the helm. Spirit was pointing north and I could turn the autopilot off. Spirit was quietly heading north at between one and two knots. If we got far enough north then the winds would change and become westerlies, but that was about 60nm away. 

I decided to email Roger Badham for instructions on this weather, and was I doing the best thing to be out of it as soon as possible? I had not used Roger since Cape Horn and I had been doing the best course that I could to keep out of the worst of the weather. The horse had bolted, as they say, on this one and Roger confirmed this. I just had to do the best I could till it was over. Roger confirmed my course of action as being the best by heading north.

For two days I lay hove to and ended up loosing ground and ending up farther to the west. Spirit handled the atrocious conditions well again and just shook off all the horrific crunches and knocks that she received. We had been knocked down again, which had really concerned me as I wondered if the wind was just too strong to hove to. The alternative was to hand steer and this did not appeal to me very much at all. I knew it was a lot further out of this low-pressure system than the one that I had had to hand steer through at Cape Horn.

At 0600 it was time to start sailing and the wind, for some reason, had swung more to the south. I was able to sail in a northeasterly direction and across the swell and waves to windward. At least it was sort of in the right direction.

I needed that wind generator going again so I made an effort to replace the switch. No luck there so I replaced the circuit breaker and still no luck. I had a brand new generator still in its box so as the wind and waves subsided then I would try to replace the whole unit.

At noon I recorded a days run of 160nm with just twin headsail. This 160nm equaled 140nm closer to home. I was now under Madagascar and with no progress east for those two days hove to, my daily average had taken a beating yet again.

This incredibly slow progress was wearing me down. It was just so much slower than the Pacific. I know that I had problems, but I thought that I should have been able to average a better speed. It was getting me down.

Home was in front of me and I had been sailing for what now felt like ages. I was now recording in my log my distance to go and my day's run made good east.

To read more on the Ken Gourlay adventure, follow the links below:
» Ken Gourlay Pt 1
» Ken Gourlay Pt 2
» Ken Gourlay Pt 3
» Ken Gourlay Pt 4
» Ken Gourlay Pt 5
» Ken Gourlay Pt 6
» Ken Gourlay Pt 7
» Ken Gourlay Pt 9
» Ken Gourlay Pt 10