Looking back on the last 6 months of voyaging.
It has been a great voyage which at times has presented challenges but no major problems.
Once in the South East trade winds North of Rarotonga it was generally pleasant easy sailing with the wind usually aft of the beam and shorts and T shirt weather. The only dangers were from the rapid increases in wind strength around rain squalls. We could see them coming in the daylight but more care was needed to keep a good weather eye at night. Reef passes in places were a little tricky especially when the GPS did not coincide with the chart (which could be several hundreds of metres out of the true position).
We enjoyed all the islands we visited but some were more special. Aitutaki had an ideal small sheltered harbour and the people were very friendly.
Suwarrow was definitely the highlight of the voyage and a place we had planned to visit for ages. It was so isolated – no airstrip, no cargo shipping calling in. You could only go there if you had your own yacht. The book ‘An Island to Oneself ‘ by Tom Neale describes his years on Suwarrow living as a hermit – it is well worth a read.
The wild life – particularly the bird life was amazing.
Samoa was a totally different type of experience tied up to a pontoon in a Marina in the capital Apia. We stayed longer than expected as Denise had to have a root canal filling but we explored the island and enjoyed our stay, including visiting the former home of Robert Louis Stevenson. Many yachties had themselves tattooed here and certainly it seemed like most of the population, including the women , had at least one tattoo.
In Savaii, the smaller of the two Samoan islands, we had a quieter time.
Wallis Island had a beautiful large lagoon with one main island and several smaller ones on the margins of the lagoon. If we had spoken French I think we would have enjoyed our stay even more as English was not much understood,
Fiji was great especially Savusavu in the north and our port of entry. The Fijians are such a cheerful bunch of folk. The Indians perhaps a little more reserved but still very friendly. We are certainly hoping to go there again in the future.
Having a good crew in Ted for the Auckland to Rarotonga and Fiji to Auckland legs of the voyage worked out very well and we had a lot of joking and yarning. We both enjoy the challenge of being at sea and making an ocean crossing.
I have written a few notes more specifically about Katipo which may be of interest to sailors reading this blog.
The whale
There were many excellent sailing days on the long first leg to Rarotonga although the collision with the whale was a concern lest there were any structural problems caused which we had not been able to identify. In fact later, when we could dive under the hull, we found a ‘ding’ under the port hull, and also a small longitudinal crack under the strong wooden laminated fore main beam which probably was caused by the sudden unyielding impact on Katipo. Good job we were not sailing a keeler!
The Parachute
The experience in bad weather of being held bow on to the parachute sea anchor mid ocean on two occasions was most interesting and very successful. It proved much easier to deploy the parachute than expected but took a while after the bad weather to get it back on board.
What we had not anticipated was the force exerted on the small trim tabs (like a small rudder attached to the back of the main rudders and linked to the self steering wind vane). We initially lashed them amid ship but when surging backwards as a wave struck before the parachute ‘kicked in’ and pulled us forward, the load on them caused a bolt to shear on the arm at the top of the trim tab. After that we let them swing with the seas with no further problems. The tillers were lashed amid ship using thick rubber bungy straps.
Like the trim tabs, the rudders were under quite a load and this caused some wear on the pintles - however not enough to be a problem for the rest of the trip.
We used the parachute because of very big seas and very strong head winds. We could have sailed on but would not have made much progress and it would have been very wearing on crew and boat. Another reason was that a glue join in the base of the engine box which is between the hulls, had opened up and when pounding into big head seas caused sea water to squirt through the crack into the engine box. Unfortunately the leak was in a position impossible to get to from the top. Shay and I later repaired the leak in Rarotonga harbour by lying on our backs in the dinghy under the centre deck while screwing a patch into place. This fixed that problem for the rest of the voyage.
Sails
The sails, though twenty three years old, held up well. The new large furling reacher proved excellent in light winds.
One improvement next time would be to consider a roller furling head sail because with hanked on sails we often sailed under-canvassed. This happens because you may be sailing along fine, then a squall comes through and you reduce sail, then because it looks like more squalls could be imminent you do not put up more sail because it is a fair amount of effort. If you had a furler you could wind the sail in and out frequently as required. It could be easily done from the cockpit.
Anchoring
We used a 20 kg Bruce anchor with 20 metres of 10mm chain and 100 metres of 18mm nylon warp. We often had to anchor in water up to 18 metres deep. We were lucky to never drag anchor and never got the chain or warp tangled round a coral head or other obstruction.
I think 30 metres of chain would be even better – I often imagined that the warp might be quietly chafed through under the water while we slept. An electric powered anchor winch would have made life easier but on the other hand winding in the anchor by hand keeps you fit.
Engine
The 20 Hp Kubota diesel did well, starting every time at the first turn of the switch. It proved only just adequate to enter a couple of the passes in the coral where swift outgoing currents tried to drag us out to sea again.
When ocean crossing we rarely motor preferring to save fuel for any emergency situation should it arise like losing a mast etc
Chart Plotter and instruments
We had a fairly old Navman chart plotter and instruments . Our speed over the ground by the GPS was usually faster by a half to one knot than the boat log recorded. We estimated our corrected voyage distance to be a total of 5,500 nautical miles.
We also had a back up chart plotter program on our lap top, a hand held GPS, and a sextant.
Beam lashings and Rigging Lanyards
The four crossbeams are lashed onto the hulls in a total of sixteen places. No adjustments were needed although I did tweek a couple of the frapping lines. They probably would have been ok anyway.
The standing rigging stainless wires were attached to the hulls with lashings and I did not need to tighten these during the voyage.
Water and supplies
We had no water maker but had no trouble obtaining good water in the places we visited. We carried the water in 15 litre plastic containers which were easy to fill by taking them ashore in the dinghy. What we should have organized before we left New Zealand was a rain water collecting system – maybe by putting a lip around the roof of the central pod.
Extra water for washing clothes or ourselves would have been good. Denise would have liked more fresh water for hair washing!
Washing up dishes in sea water proved fine, especially with washing up liquid designed for us e with sea water. We did not do this of course in ports where the water was probably suspect!
We stocked up with plenty of basic supplies in Auckland and these lasted well. We bought more as we needed them and plenty of fresh fruit and vegetables. We tried some foods we had not had before like arrowroot – a root crop and the unusual soursop fruits. There were inexpensive excellent snacks available in the islands like Taro and also Cassava chips.
Health
Cruising is generally a healthy life. Denise had bad luck injuring her wrist in a fall on a slippery boat ramp and earlier having to have a root canal filling. I lost some weight and came back fitter than when I set out.
We had mosquito screens which we could velcro into place on open hatches at night. They were used mainly in places like Samoa where we were tied up in a marina or near the shore. Generally at anchor in a bay the breeze kept mosquitoes away.
I noticed that minor wounds seemed to take much longer to heal than when onshore. This was particularly so when on the longer ocean passages – perhaps because one is wet and salty much of the time!
