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| Fleet Hanging on the Hook in St. George's Harbor |
We ended up spending two
extra days in Bermuda – one due to weather, the other to allow Aeoli to tend to some much needed and
rather difficult bottom cleaning. With
the longest leg of the journey looming in front of us, it was important that
both bottom and running gear be foul-free to allow for optimal hull efficiency
– which significantly affects fuel usage and range.
Thus on Saturday 27-May we had some down time to spend as desired
(well, except for the Aeoli gang). The day’s weather was delightful so crews
dinghied to shore and fanned out across Bermuda from St. George to Hamilton to
take in more sights and local food and drink.
Cameron invited everyone over to Jura
for a pre-departure party, a great way to end another fine day.
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| All Hands Party Aboard Cameron's N57 Jura |
We headed over to Customs
early on Sunday morning 28-May for outprocessing, and then readied the
boats for departure. By the time we got
dinghies cradled on the boat deck and the anchors up after washing off some of
the worst anchor snot we’d seen in a long time – heavy gray clay that stuck
like glue – it was just after 1000. We
hailed Bermuda Radio with our required departure calls as we sortied out the
channel in single file and aimed the pointy ends towards Horta in the Azores.
Our early morning
weather briefing from Commanders indicated mostly benign conditions for the
coming week. We did take a slightly more
southerly track for the first two days to stay clear of rougher water to our
north, but the deviation from original plan was slight. Early feedback from Aeoli was that their clean bottom was greatly improving their fuel
efficiency, so we were able to bump fleet speed up from 6.5 to 7.1 knots for
most of the day.
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| Departing View of Bermuda |
The five boat fleet assumed a
pentagon formation with one mile spacing, and we did our best to match Aeoli’s speed at which she was getting
an acceptable fuel burn rate. As the
smallest boat with the least fuel (even with a 300 gallon bladder in her
cockpit), this long leg could present a challenge if her fuel wasn’t managed
carefully. In such cases – and this
isn’t a totally unusual challenge for ocean crossers – the protocol is to set
your throttle to a burn rate that will assure arrival with a 15% reserve; that
inevitably will be a very slow speed, but at various intervals along the way
you always recalculate and adjust as required:
as you burn fuel and reduce weight the boat gets more efficient; and you
may get more favorable currents and sea conditions along the way (or not). Either way, you can control your range with
your throttle.
Several boats had fishing
lines in the water most of the day, but the expected action departing Bermuda
did not materialize. Sometimes we caught
pieces and parts of jellyfish, but that’s about it.
Radio
chatter from Michele on Jura: “Does anyone have a recipe for seaweed?”
We enjoyed another beautiful
sunset on our stern as we continued to motor eastward in fair conditions and
readied ourselves for the night shift routines.
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| Another Great Sunset at Sea |
Some of the boats had lost crew members
in Bermuda so shift assignments for helm duties had to be adjusted to
accommodate fewer souls on board. Each
vessel had its own methodology that worked for them, but any way you slice it
it’s all just a maritime experiment in sleep deprivation if you have less than
four in the crew count.
In addition to helm shifts,
another common practice among voyaging vessels is for the crew to eat at least
one meal together, typically dinner, and the pilot house settee generally makes
a good gathering place since whomever has the helm can also be part of the
socialization as well as the meal. Time
of day for that can vary, but generally we find ourselves eating earlier at sea
than we do when we are dirt-dwelling.
For other meals each crewmember is on their own – a properly provisioned
boat will have something for everyone, and they know where to find it in the
galley. And it is a good idea keep a bowl of snacks – some healthy, some perhaps
not so much – at the pilot house settee for folks to raid at their convenience;
that really comes in handy during the graveyard shifts.
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| The 3 Person Helm Watch / Shift Schedule Aboard Relish |
On Monday
29-May dawn had arrived with temps in
the upper 60’s, light winds, and once again gently rolling seas, although we
had considerable overcast and had been painting rain showers on the radar set
(with lightning in the distance) most of the night. Even though we were essentially in the middle
of the Atlantic Ocean, we still sighted occasional traffic on radar or via our
AIS transponders, and you had to be vigilant for the occasional crossing
pattern.
Radio
chatter from Bob on Moxie: “My AIS for that freighter at our 3 o’clock
says it’s headed to Gibraltar at 11 knots….how’ bout we all just tie onto him?”
Overall, however, Monday was mostly
uneventful, with reasonably soft following seas that gradually increased as the
day and evening wore on to around 5 feet.
Once again there wasn’t much fishing action, although on our route
that’s probably to be expected given the 17,000 foot depth and lack of any
nearby nearby structure or seamounts.
Nevertheless, late in the day Jura
reported two, nearly simultaneous, hookups.
They were likely large tuna because they stayed deep and spooled both of
their fishing rigs.
Early in the day on Tuesday 29-May we received an updated weather briefing from Commanders that wasn’t
particularly optimistic, although it wasn’t terrible either. A low pressure trough was developing to our
north and moving ESE, and we were advised to stay south of 34N latitude for the
most tolerable sea states. It would bring windy conditions to 24 knots and seas
building to 7-9 feet for the next couple of days. After that they were optimistic that
conditions would settle a bit, but they still recommended we alter course
further south for a better ride. And we
did.
About this time we start to
realize the challenge of posting daily updates to a blog when almost nothing is
changing – same boats, same crews, mostly the same weather, and waters that
look suspiciously similar to yesterday’s ocean.
We avoided the temptation to cut and paste from previous days’ diaries.
Radio
chatter from Stefan on Aeoli: “This feels
a lot like 'Groundhog Day'.”
The graying skies and worsening seas
didn’t stop us from putting out the fishing lines for a while, although most
folks really didn’t want to catch anything – slowing or stopping the boat would
have been really uncomfortable in those sea conditions.
Stephan (skipper of Aleoli) helped the fleet pass some time by serenading Silvio with a
few Italian tunes broadcast over our ship-to-ship VHF channel, one of which we
recognized as an old Julio Eglasias riff.
Stephan – who is from, and is now returning to, Mallorca – played a few
others that absolutely nobody recognized except for him. Relish
pitched in with broadcasts of Sloop John
B (Beach Boys) and Buffett’s ode to the ocean Treat Her Like a Lady ….
Some of us
sailors call her home
She’s big and
she’s strong and she’s mighty
Some of us
sailors call her home
And I guess
that’s the reason why I treat her like a lady
We had been bucking a current for most
of the morning, and then around mid-day we somehow escaped that and the waves
subsided a bit as a result – for a short while at least, the seas weren’t
battling or colliding with the wind as much.
We enjoyed the respite and got the fishing lines wet yet again. A few boats reported more bottlenose dolphin
sightings, and the occasional Portuguese Man of War, but there was no luck with
the fishing.
Later in the afternoon the seas picked
up as predicted, and everyone was glad to have an efficient pair of stabilizer
fins.
Relish had been monitoring a slight hydraulic fluid leak in the
starboard actuator locking pin, but so far it was holding up fine, and believed
it wouldn’t require attention until we got to Horta, perhaps even
Gibraltar. On the other hand, Jura was reporting that its ABT Trac
(stabilizer) control panel was throwing low pressure warnings; after Cameron
went through his troubleshooting steps the issue eventually boiled down to the
low RPM settings on the main engine (which provides the PTO for the stabilizer
hydraulic pump) in agitated sea states. Let’s just say that the Nordhavn 57
isn’t designed for going this slow.
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| Planned Route in Blue. Actual Route in Red. |
About the same time the sailing vessel Viva came into view on our radar and AIS
displays. She had been moored near us
back in Bermuda, where the crew of Jura had
helped her rig some sails for the coming leg to Horta. Since she was also headed to the Azores, we
hailed them on VHF channel 16, shared our weather forecast with them, and
offered to try and stay in touch as they made their way across the big
pond. It’s interesting to note that
while our weather router had us deviating further south, Viva had no interest in that – she wanted the wind.
By the end of the day we were surfing
down the faces of some 8 and 9 foot waves, and our trip log indicated that we
had covered 417 miles since leaving Bermuda, and over 1,400 nautical miles in
total since departing Palm Beach, with Relish
clocking 1,600 miles since Nassau.
Daybreak on Wednesday 31-May greeted us with gray skies, winds from the southwest
at 10-12 knots, following seas averaging 6 feet, and a line of showers
developing in front of us extending from the NE to the SW. At that point our
instrumentation showed:
Speed:
6.5K SOG
Wind:
235 @ 10K
Seas:
4-7 feet
(following)
Temp: 76F
SST: 73F
Humidity: 100%
Pressure: 29.84 & steady
Trip Odo: 1,450
NM (1,650 for Relish)
Distance to Horta: 1,367 NM (1100 NM due east of the U.S.
coastline)
ETA to Horta: 08-June
That line of showers grew in size and
intensity, but was now moving away from us at a greater speed than what we
could muster, so it was mostly a non-factor. As the day progressed the winds began to decrease,
as did wave heights, with increasing intervals between the swells. But sunshine was limited to intermittent
bursts through a largely overcast sky.
We had the fishing lines out all day but saw no action.
One crew member on Angela, on the other hand, claims they
caught fish on several different occasions and quickly got it vacuum sealed in
convenient little bags that only by sheer coincidence had the “Costco” name on
the side.
Radio chatter
from Rick on Relish: “Geez, I just saw a dragonfly strafe our
boat; what their range?”
Reply
from Shar on Moxie: “You’re hallucinating from lack of sleep.”
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| The Busted Toilet Seat |
Another line of showers moved
through in the wee hours of the morning on Thursday 01-Jun, but once again passed clear
of us to the north at a range of 5 to 15 miles.
During the night winds died down considerably, but the large swells
continued, and we were now headed mostly into them vs. having a following
sea. By daybreak winds picked up again,
but not enough to add wind chop to the top of the swells, which were now
running about 6-9 feet, and thankfully at greater intervals.
We deployed the fishing rigs once again,
but did not plan to bring the boat to a stop for any fish that hit. Moxie
tried that and the big swells started tossing things around like missiles,
including a cabinet door in the forward head that departed its hinges and
smacked into the toilet, cracking the seat.
The toilet is still operable, and Bob reports they may have found a new
use for the ship’s throw ring.
At this point we were in the
middle of what is known as the Sargasso Sea, which while not bordered by any
particular land mass, is framed by four major current systems that tend to
isolate these Atlantic waters – basically a big gyre that collects seaweed
(sargassum) as well as all kinds of garbage.
Glenn on
Aleoli sighted a floating oil barrel
and either a busted spar or a telephone pole, and Relish sighted one of those jugs that we associate with rum and
pirates, along with some other unrecognizable floating junk. Given our distance from any land mass, we
have to assume all of it is garbage dispersed by other boats. (We may throw
some biodegradables over the side, but we bag all other trash and store it on
the boat deck until we reach port.)
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| The Sargasso Sea |
Late that afternoon we sighted a
sailboat also headed in our general direction.
It was only a 26 footer, and they had poor sailing conditions with light
winds and some very tall swells. We
hailed them a few times with no response; but then Michele (a French Canadian
from Montreal) aboard Jura tried
again in French, and soon a lengthy dialog had been established.
Radio
chatter from Bob on Moxie: “Hey, ask him if he’s got a spare toilet
seat.”
The day ended quietly with another
picturesque sunset over the Atlantic waters, but again we found no fish out
here.
Showers continued to form and dissipate
all through the night as well as during the first half of the day on Friday 02-Jun, all generally light activity with no embedded TRWs detected. Temperatures remained pleasant, hovering
around 70F, and for the most part boats ran without the genset. Seas had picked
up a bit in the early morning hours shortly after daybreak (6-8 foot swells
with some wind chop on top) but then settled again by mid-day to less than 4
feet.
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| Nearby Showers on the Radar |
We fetched another weather forecast just
before Noon and saw fairly reasonable projections. A low pressure system spinning up further
north would eventually close in on us and bring higher winds (gusts to 30) and
steeper seas (up to 8 feet with nasty wind chop & short intervals) by early
next week, but then improve thereafter.
All in all, that’s pretty benign for this part of the Atlantic Ocean and
didn’t warrant a routing change.
Several of the boats spent some time
coordinating service work to be done in Horta once we arrive there. Aboard Moxie Bob arranged for Rob, his nav/comm
technician, to fly out to address his sat phone/Internet issues (previously
mentioned, but we should have said it was actually a KVH failure, not an
Iridium issue.) Relish also wanted some time from Rob as
well to look at some minor issues around some funky Maretron readings, a dead
cockpit camera and some SSB radio challenges.
Jura and Relish had each developed a small punch list for Yacht Tech, while Angela needed some generator parts. And Aleoli
would require some water maker parts.
When this long leg started our fleet of
5 boats had instituted a daily protocol of conducting a “conference call” on
VHF channel 14 to report detailed fuel status every day at 1400. Each boat reported its main engine fuel burn
for the past 24 hours, as well as burn rate and generator usage, along with RPM
and SOG. The main goal was to establish
/ maintain a speed and burn rate that would provide the smaller boat (Aleoli)
with a comfortable reserve as we approached the Azores; but it was also an
opportunity to gather and eventually share fuel efficiency and consumption
metrics with the larger Nordhavn community.
Right at dusk about two dozen dolphin
vectored in on the fleet and cruised the bow waves again. The day ended
peacefully with mild rolling seas, partly cloudy skies, temperatures in the low
70’s and a light breeze out of the southwest.
We had another 6 days to go before we’d reach Horta.
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| Dolphins Streaking By Headed for the Bow Wave |
Saturday morning sunrise on Saturday 03-Jun started with a few low clouds on the horizon, but over
the next couple hours those burned off and by 0700 we had mostly clear
conditions with a light 10K breeze from the southeast and gentle seas – 3 foot
rollers and a minor wind chop on top. Moxie sighted another whale broaching
the surface nearby.
Overnight Relish had passed its halfway mark (roughly 2000 total nautical
miles based on revised routing) for the journey from Nassau to Gibraltar. Later in the day the remainder of the fleet
passed its halfway point. The crew of
Moxie celebrated by slowing the boat and dumping its supply of “Moxie Cola”
(some kind of orange-flavored carbonated drink) into the Atlantic Ocean,
followed shortly thereafter by Bob’s hat with the Moxie insignia on it. Soon
after that Peter reported sighting that whale again, this time wearing Bob’s
hat and doing a Michael Jackson dance on the ocean surface. We suspect Moxie’s crew got into the Bloody Mary pitcher mistaking it for
regular tomato juice.
Eventually the radio chatter turned
attention to our planned upcoming pot luck dinner at the Horta docks;
apparently there was concern that not enough fish was being caught and we may
be short on proteins for that group dinner.
After quick inventories of the burgers, chicken and other meats that
were still in the freezers (and Michelle’s insistence that we still had time to
catch fish), we concluded all was still well.
Radio
chatter from Stefan on Aleoli: “What do you guys have against restaurants?”
Someone also commented that there was a
famous Scottish restaurant located there; but it turns out it’s called
MacDonald’s and has golden arches.
After sunset we were all planning to
fire off some expired flares, mainly for training purposes; but hey, who
doesn’t like pyrotechnics for entertainment?
It was suggested by Bob on Moxie
that we try at least one smoke grenade now (during daylight) to test its
visibility, so we did. Each boat first
announced our intention on VHF channel 16 via a “securite” call just in case
there were any other vessels nearby who might mistake it as an actual distress
signal. Since we were smack in the
middle of the Atlantic Ocean – roughly 1,685 NM from the U.S. coastline and 1,750
NM from Spain, we didn’t think there was much of a chance that anyone was
within visual, much less radio, range.
We were wrong.
Shortly after Moxie’s orange smoke bomb went off Relish received a VHF transmission from a sailboat named Meka at about 1230 local time. They were
asking if we had any diesel fuel to spare. After some back and forth
conversation it was determined their fuel need was not presently an emergency
situation but might eventually turn into one.
We plotted their reported position (bearing 207M @ 9.9NM) and after a
brief discussion among the fleet, we decided to dispatch Angela and Moxie, so they
peeled off to the SSW to intercept the sailboat. We also had Meka alter its course towards us to
close the distance gap a bit faster, while Relish,
Jura and Aeoli maintained their
original course and speed for the interim. As that was in progress Rob aboard Angela and Rick aboard Relish tested their two-way inReach
texting communications one more time in case we lost VHF contact with them.
The plan was for Meka to take down her spinnaker as the gap closed, launch her
dinghy loaded with their five empty jerry cans, tie up to Moxie’s stern, and then use Moxie’s
wing engine’s day tank to drain fuel into the fuel cans. This is the inReach text messaging update we
received from Rob aboard Angela:
Vessel is a catamaran from Tortola approximately 50’
with 3 males on board, Reg #743111, British.
He is a delivery skipper. Jerry
jugs on Moxie. Vessel name corrected to
Meka. [We had previously thought it was ‘Nika’.] Moxie has the cans and are
filling them now. This is the 37th time the skipper of Meka has
crossed the Atlantic.
Subsequent conversations filled in the
blanks, but basically the fuel offload went without incident, although the
recipients didn’t seem all that grateful for Moxie’s efforts. The entire
episode left Angela and Moxie about 15 miles behind Jura, Aeoli and Relish, and while Relish was able to maintain VHF radio contact
with them the entire time, it wouldn’t be until the following day before they
would be able to rejoin the formation and the planned route to Horta.
In the interim our sea conditions were
about as good as it gets in the middle of the Atlantic with sunny skies and
light breezes, and the temperature hovering right around 70F. And as the sun dropped in the west we enjoyed
several more strafing runs by large pods of spotted dolphin, with some of the
smaller and younger ones getting quite acrobatic as they darted in and out of
the bow waves.
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| The Rejoin in Progress on Radar |
Daybreak brought overcast skies to us on
Sunday 04-Jun along with a few spotty rain showers on the radar, the
closest at 5 miles to the southeast. Angela and Moxie had closed to within 4.5 miles as they approached us from
the WSW at our 4 o’clock….roughly 17 hours after they had split off on their Meka intercept mission. Our Nobeltec and Furuno systems told us we
had a little over 4 days and 725 NM to Horta in the Azores.
By 1030 we were back in our preferred
(octagonal) 5-ship formation once again, with all boats tucked into their usual
slots, and every vessel reporting ops normal.
Weather still presented a high overcast, winds at 10K from the SW,
ambient air at 70F as was SST, with following seas very smooth at 2-3 foot
gentle swells and a light wind chop on top.
At noon the fleet conducted its group
weather briefing, presenting the latest forecast from Commanders (LINK), and
then at 1400 we likewise conducted our daily fuel consumption report and
review. The net results of those two
were:
1. Some lousy
weather moving in from the east beginning Tuesday evening with rain, gusts to
35K and 7 foot seas; followed by improvements on Wednesday; and then going to
hell again on Thursday as we neared Horta, with gusts to 40K churning up 8 foot
swells and 5 feet of wind chop. At least
the wind and seas would be coming from behind.
2. Everyone’s fuel
status still looked positive, with even Aleoli
estimating a 25% reserve upon reaching the Azores; and the 20 mile
diversion and 20 gallon fuel donation by Moxie
and Angela on yesterday’s Good
Samaritan mission still left them with adequate reserves as well.
Nevertheless, the group decided to
maintain current speed and course rather than attempt to speed up – fuel
consumption rate (for Aleoli in
particular) during the coming squalls was an unknown, as were impacts from
potentially adverse ocean currents.
We’ll fetch another weather update on Tuesday and recalibrate as
required at that time.
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| The Final Leg into Horta in the Azores |
We had rescheduled our “pyro night” for
this evening, so about 2 hours after sunset each boat gathered a collection of
expired hand-held flares, flare guns cartridges and parachute flares and
prepared to detonate them, with each vessel taking a turn so the others could
see how each device appeared from a distance.
After making the requisite “securite” radio call we got started. The
SOLAS parachute flares outperformed everything else with excellent hang /
loiter time and a very bright white corona visible for several miles. However, our old 12 gauge cartridges fired
from an Orion flare pistol did better than we expected with good altitude and
reasonable duration of its bright red light.
The handheld flares were also brightly visible from 2+ miles although
obviously could not match the visible range of the more ballistic options. It was a fun and educational way to wrap up
another day at sea, at least for those who were still awake.
We still had 600 NM to traverse before
we’d arrive in Horta.
We had bright sunshine and brisk breezes
out of the south to start off on Monday 05-Jun, but temps continued to slowly drop – 68F at 0900 –
and the ocean brought some commotion with 2 to 3 footers at short intervals on
the starboard beam. But compared to the
forecast we were quite happy with it, and as the day progressed the wind
started backing more towards the SW and towards our stern. We continued to buck currents off and on,
although the historical pilot charts for this part of the ocean indicated we
might get a break on that soon.
Aleoli spent a large part of its day troubleshooting its
water maker problem, and eventually cobbled together a solution to restore
power to its low pressure pump component.
They would seek a more permanent solution once they arrived in Horta,
but for now they were quite happy with Daniel’s
electrical sleuthing and workaround.
It was cool enough outside that air
conditioning was really optional at this point, and aboard Relish it also had made Michelle’s spicy chili an appealing dish
for dinner the night before. From a
wardrobe perspective it was becoming clear that some of us hadn’t packed very
well (Rick and Bernie in particular); as it turns out south Florida May-June
clothing isn’t very well suited to this part of the Atlantic at this time of
year.
As for the chili (delicious!) Silvio
must have really liked it because he was also munching on a bowl of it for
breakfast this morning. Of course,
between the odd helm shifts and the time zone changes (we were now UTC -1),
determining whether you were eating breakfast, lunch or dinner was sometimes
problematic, or at the very least subject to personal interpretation.
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| Napping in the Pilot House |
Towards evening two targets popped up on
our radar at about the same time – the first was later identified on AIS as S/V
Lynn Rival, a 12 meter sloop bearing NNW who at first seemed intent on sailing
into the middle of the formation. She wouldn’t answer any of our radio calls,
but we bumped the throttles a tad and moved ahead to make her a non-factor,
although she did pass within a mile of Aleoli
at the back of the formation just after nightfall. The second target was
only a radar blip (no AIS) to our ESE, and after dropping an ARPA cursor on it
we guessed it was another sailboat since its SOG was only 4.5K at the
time. Over time it picked up speed and
hung with us most of the night, and eventually we had to alter course a bit to
pass on her port side with comfortable separation.
Traffic would likely continue to
increase as we neared Horta, which by sunrise the next day was only 390 miles
away.
Overnight the winds picked up a bit to
15 knots, still out of the SW, and while the ride was a bit sloppy with short
and steep 3 footers, it was by no means rough or uncomfortable (at least for
now.) Both ambient and sea surface temps
were at 66F, and we had a high overcast as of the morning of Tuesday 06-Jun. As
of 0730 local time (0830 UTC) our key stats looked as follows:
Speed:
6.7K SOG
Wind:
210 @ 15K
Seas:
3-4 feet
Temp: 66F
SST: 66F
Humidity: 100%
Pressure: 30.00 / falling
Trip Odo: 2,425 NM (since
Palm Beach)
Trip Odo (Relish): 2,625 NM (since Nassau)
Distance to Horta: 380 NM (1,100 NM due east of the U.S.
coastline)
ETA to Horta: Mid-day
on 08-June
We conducted our usual afternoon fleet
conferences via VHF, the highlight of those being the latest weather
forecast. It had improved a bit, but we
were still looking at worsening conditions beginning tonight with some showers,
SW winds @ 25K and 4 to 7 foot seas; then seas building to 10 feet and 11 second
intervals on Wednesday. On Thursday
conditions would start similarly, but with winds and seas increasing late in
the day to 32 knots and 13 feet. The
message was clear: getting to Horta as
early as possible on Thursday was desirable.
An email that Aeoli had
received from our agent in Horta (Duncan Sweet with Mid Atlantic Yacht
Services) pretty much confirmed that as well. Everyone agreed they had the fuel
to bump up the RPMs a bit, so we did.
Throughout the day the seas gradually
built as predicted to 7 feet with a 15 to 20 knot wind from the WSW. And those also decreased slightly (as
predicted) as the sun set, just as the forecast scattered showers began showing
on the radar.
 |
| Rolling Swells on the Stern |
We had 285 nautical miles and just over
40 hours remaining to reach Horta in the Azores.
By the early morning hours of Wednesday 07-Jun the winds had died off to a few knots out of the west
and the seas were correspondingly smooth….although we knew that would not last
long. But it made for some good sleeping
and a peaceful night watch shift. At
daybreak we were still blessed with the same conditions, along with ambient air
temp of 66F and an SST of 68F, winds westerly and light, and now that we could
see them, waves were still only 2-3 feet at worst and still on the stern.
We had been staggering our time changes
– moving our clocks forward by an hour – about every 3 days. That plus a 7 knot moving average surely made
the more traditional “jet lag” a non-factor, although generally the fatigue
factor was still high on the scale with the overnight helm shifts. Today we’d officially be in the next time
zone – GMT-1, aka Zulu or UTC. We had
crossed 4 time zones.
Somewhat surprisingly as of 1300 UTC,
with 175 NM and 25 hours to go until we reached Horta, we were still
experiencing generally calm conditions, but as the afternoon progressed the SW
swells started to gradually build as the wind began to pick up. Air temp hovered around 65F and SST at 67F,
with a west wind around 12 knots. We had
a very high and thin overcast that still allowed for plenty of sunshine to bore
through. But far in the distance to the
northwest we could see a line of cumulonimbus building – no doubt the leading
edge of that coming front which would be squeezing the pressure gradient ever
tighter.
 |
Fishing in the Swells with a Scotch on the Rocks Nearby....Great Way to Wind Down
a Day....Guess Who? |
By late afternoon the wind and waves
were in accordance with Commanders’ latest forecast, with south-westerlies up
to 14 knots and rolling swells at 8 to 10 feet coming from the northwest. It was a comfortable ride as we all surfed
the following seas and continued to troll the fishing lines.
Nevertheless, the forecast for mid-day
tomorrow – as we would be approaching Horta – was calling for gusts to 30 knots
with swells to 9 feet and perhaps 5 foot wind waves on top of that. So we used this time to ready the boat for
rough running. Essentially that meant
all loose items were securely stowed or lashed in some fashion, all drawer and
cabinet latches were in the closed or locked position, and all portals and
hatches were (or would be) dogged down, and all spare part containers and oil
barrels down in the laz ang engine room were strapped down.
Shortly before sunset, Cameron on Jura downloaded the latest high
resolution GRIB weather file and from that noted the weather system seemed to
be moving a bit slower than earlier prognosticated. That would be good for us if we could make
the turn into Horta’s protected harbor before it started blowing really hard.
As the sun set behind us we could easily
make out the line of ominous clouds heaing our way. But we also had a nearly full moon beaming
like a spotlight tonight, and we only had 112 NM to go to reach our destination
in the Azores.
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| Angela Fendering Up Before Entering Horta's Harbor |
Daylight on Thursday 08-Jun brought a high overcast….65F, SST 66F, winds 15K from SW, swells @ 8
feet with comfy intervals and a few feet of wind chop. Not great, but surely not as bad as
forecast. At 0900 we were just over 20
miles from the Azores, with an ETA between 1230 and 1300 depending on which SOG
readout you wanted to believe.
The ride into Horta was pretty benign
overall – the big storm and frontal system had slowed, and we hit a weather
window that was good enough for all boats to tie up. While it was quite breezy the skippers
handled their boats magnificently. It’s
a bit crowded here, so Relish and Jura moored alongside the big commercial
sea wall, and everyone else took up a rafted position from there (and dropped
an anchor in the process as a precaution against the 40 knot winds yet to
come.) Not the most elegant or
convenient arrangement, but we were happy to be there nonetheless.
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| Azores Coming into View from the Pilot House |
All boats took on some fuel from the
truck today, although with the exception of Aleoli the others did not need to top off all tanks.and then we’re seeking a long walk on land and the nearest
pub. And then some uninterrupted sleep
before we delve into the weekend maintenance activities.
As of now it appears that only Angela, Moxie and Relish will depart together for the next leg to Gibraltar, likely
on Monday. Aleoli will hang out here an extra day or so to enjoy some time
with family visitors who flew in to join them.
And Jura is headed north to
England and Scotland.
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| Rafted Up in Horta |
We also have one crew change in the works....Michele who has been aboard Jura for this long leg to Horta will jump aboard Relish so he can also get to Gibraltar with the rest of us. That also gives the current threesome on Relish a much more tolerable watch schedule for that next leg. Welcome Michele!! Of course that now gives them two folks with the same name, we need to noodle nicknames to manage that.
After refueling was completed it was a nice change of pace to get off the boat and walk into town for a meal and a few libations to wrap up a very tiring but satisfying journey.
As the weekend weather outlook here improves - rain ending and sunshine over the next few days - it's likely we'll get more time off the boat and the opportunity to tour an island or two in the Azores chain (there are nine in this volcanic archipelago). So if the opportunity presents itself we'll try to post more photos.
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| Chelle and Rick on the Bow with the Azores Looming in the Background |
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| Five Nordhavns Rafted Up in the Horta Harbor |
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| View of the South Harbor from the Town |
