Terceira to Flores is a little over 200 miles and should take two or three days depending on the wind. We took 28 days and travelled 2278 miles. The as the seagull flies distance to Newport is around 2050 miles.
After leaving Terceira the priorities were: look after the boat; look after myself and try to get west. In order to do the first two, we had to get further south, where the water and air temperatures are warmer and the winds generally lighter than at higher latitudes. The fresh North-westerly when we left pushed us quickly south-west for the first day. I would have liked to carry on like that, but the wind slowed down and backed until we could do little better than make due south. On the second day we were treated to the sight of mount Pico clearly visible from about 50 miles south. It seemed quite symmetrical from there and often sticking its peak through a layer of cloud. A pod of dolphins came and played, giving an ideal photo opportunity with the mountain backdrop.
At 35N the water and air were noticeable warmer and life a lot more comfortable. We then made the best course westward, staying around 35 – 36N. For 9 days the winds were from the westerly quarter, so progress was slow and often not even in the right direction.
Day 9 we were almost completely becalmed when what wind there was shifted around to North, then continued veering. At last we had a breeze from an easterly quarter, so we could set three sails. Alas there was so little wind that progress was painfully slow. By the evening the wind, or what there was of it, was from due east so the twin headsails went up. At two in the morning the radar alarm started chirping away. Soon a target appeared at 12 miles on the AIS receiver which turned out to be a Chinese supertanker. It was exactly on our latitude and heading due east. There is limited scope for turning with twin sails boomed out, but I headed off as far as it was possible to starboard. As we were only making 0.7 knots it was not going to make much difference. At 7 miles his course had started to change and by 6 miles he had changed by 10 degrees. This then gave us a separation of one mile. He called me on the VHF to confirm that we were a sailing vessel and I thanked him for his early avoiding action. It proves the worth of the radar target enhancer as he must have tracked us from 8 miles or more.
I had worked out the latest time to possibly arrive at Newport and decided to call off the attempt if we had not passed half way, 50W by half that time, 1200UTC on 24th June. By then it didn’t seem likely, although a few days of half decent winds from a useful direction would have made it possible. We had more wind than needed for a few days only with force 6, gusting 7 on the second day. Scallywag behaved well in the conditions, although it was uncomfortable going with crashing and banging around in the waves. It all ended with a front that bought a heavy rain shower, enough to wash in the cockpit and collect a half a bucket full of rainwater for rinsing out some clothes.
There were other frontal systems bringing more winds than we needed but mostly they were a degree or two to the north of us. The weather-fax charts were of great use as it was mostly possible to keep us in winds of useful strength, but alas not particularly helpful direction. The UK charts had become unclear a few days after Terceira, but Offenbach with its more powerful transmitters could be received from further away. At 35N, we were running off the edge of the forecast chart, but fortunately the Boston charts started to become available. It was a bit hit and miss as poor weather could ruin the signal.
There is a lot of floating plastic junk about, and I picked up two pieces on the keel or prop. The first was one morning when I noticed the speed had dropped from 2 knots to half a knot. Going on deck to see what was up, I noticed we had picked up a long piece of rope. The strain on the rope was too great to pull it in, so I had to drop the headsail to stop us. It still took a good ten minutes and was hard work. It is easy to see how a long enough piece of rope makes an effective device for slowing a boat in heavy weather. This bit was about 400 metres long, and took up all of the cockpit well. I simply had no place to put it, so made it into a coil, tied it up and heaved it over again. At least now it is a much smaller target for other vessels. A lot of yachts come through that way returning from the Caribbean and many if not most will motor when there is little wind and could risk fouling their propeller.
A week or so to go till the cut-off date and we would have needed 84 miles per day. The next day was 88 miles, but then 50, 52 and 53 miles. The 53 was not even in the right direction, so only moved us 39 miles westward. It now looked impossible to make the target, but I wanted to keep sailing anyway and carried on to 50W. Ironically that was the best windward run with 4 consecutive days exceeding 80 miles.
After turning around we headed off more or less North-Easterly, looking for favourable currents. There had been a majority of useful currents helping us westward at 35N, but further north we should find the North Atlantic drift and the Azores current.
This return leg was a wonderful run of sailing, still warm, and running with the wind the apparent wind is less, so it feels even warmer. Scallywag was still clean on the bottom and we effortlessly clocked up good runs. The first 5 days we had the wind on the starboard quarter and with three sails spread totalled 100, 110, 121, 105 and 115 miles. The wind backed so the third sail had to go away, but with the increased apparent wind, the speed stayed about the same and we clocked another 116 miles. As predicted, the winds were then dictated by a large high pressure system and the speed dropped. Fortunately the forecasts had shown this and by shaping a course around the north of the high, we were able to keep enough wind to move us along well. The forecasts now also warned of Hurricane Arthur, which could have been hurricane disaster for us if we had not turned back.
With mostly moderate winds there was little going wrong, so I did not have a lot of essential repairs to tackle. I did a few jobs here and there including changing the rubber seals on the forehatch, which had still leaked a little when thrashing around during the strong headwinds. I had placed the rubber on the hatch, but scraped this off and applied the new stuff to the coaming. It is thick draughtproofing strip, which is more flexible and seals better. The seal was damaged when the boat was broken into 6 years ago and I repaired it at home but the repair does not exactly match the curvature on the coaming so it has never sealed well. It is now much better but still not perfect and could do with being cut and rejoined again.
I read some books, but often just sat thinking, or if that was too much effort, just sat. It was good to clear the mind and become one with the little boat and the big ocean. I spent a lot of time when there was no moon up at night looking at the stars. At 35N, many of the brightest stars in the sky, which happen to be above the southern hemisphere, are prominent. The entire large constellation of Scorpio was on show as was Spica and her spanker, a group of 4 stars which really do form the shape of a spanker, or gaff mizzen sail with the peak pointing to Spica. I remembered using Spica for evening star sights, back in the days when these things counted.
I did keep up an occasional video diary and made some instructional videos about the self steering. The other ones on YouTube are just ones I put together from some video that I had shot. I will probably have to wait until I have got home before posting the new ones as Google blocked a suspicious log in attempt from Portugal. Having to teach something often means you look into it in greater depth, and I hit upon a way to explain how to adjust the bungee tension.
Anyone not interested in self steering, skip this paragraph. It will be tedious. Otherwise stick with it because it will save you hours of frustration. Firstly the sails must be set correctly, as is the case with all self steering methods. Put the tiller approximately where it should be and set your bungee to keep it there. Let it alone for a bit and see what happens. It the boat steers to port, you will need to move the tiller to port, and vice versa. Here is the important bit: Make a small change and measure how much the adjustment was. An estimate will do, but make a note of how much it was. Then leave it again and see what happens. If it is still steering off in the same direction, make a further adjustment. If it is going off the other way, wind it back by half the amount. If it is still not stable, then adjust by a further half, or a quarter of the original. Each time the adjustment should be less, and very importantly the time interval should be more before you make a further change. This method will home in on the optimum position. I wish I had thought of it on day one from Plymouth.
This self steering business continues to delight me. Sailing is pretty wonderful stuff anyway, harnessing the wind and using it to go which way you want (well some of the time, or at least nearly which way). Using the sails and wind for steering as well doubles their value and trebles the pleasure. I found that I could use the jib sheet pulling to windward with the wind on the beam or a little ahead. I only discovered this when the AIS showed another head on situation at about 10 miles. This time we were moving well, and I was able to turn 30 degrees to starboard and this action alone gave us a separation of close to a mile. I expected to have to change the setup, but simply pulled in the sheets a bit and trimmed the bungee. It makes perfect sense as the sheet tension will still increase or decrease with the change of apparent wind speed.
The last few days before reaching Flores saw us going around a high pressure system. The straight line would have put us in the centre of the high with very light winds. We kept going well and were treated to our best dolphin display of the trip so far. It was a large pod and they kept with us for at least 15 minutes. I went for’ard and took some video of them around the bows. They never look as good in the videos, as Sod’s Law dictates that the camera will be pointed where they have just leaped, just out of frame of where they are about to.
On the final evening we gybed onto port for the final run to Flores. At 0300 the loom of the bright light on the north west of the island was visible. By dawn the north of the island was hidden by cloud. The south plunged down into the sea so steeply that it seemed impossible that people could live there. The wind followed the island, well it could hardly go through it, and steered us round the southwest and south coast. There was indeed settlements on the steep sides and steps cut into a cliff side leading down to a flat area by the coast where there was fields marked by rock walls and some buildings. I would later walk down the steps in the cliff and take a bus ride to the settlements on the slopes.
We sailed past the breakwater into Lajes harbour and dropped the sails before motoring into the new marina. It was Saturday morning, but the off duty harbourmaster came down to ask me to move to an inside finger pontoon, a better spot than the reception pontoon, and see him on Monday for the paperwork.
Adventures of Scallywag II 