Day 16 - April 22, Friday
We’re meandering along at around 4 knots, or a bit less, in 7 to 9 knots of NE wind. Jimmy Cornell says we should be benefitting from the 1 knot Southern Equatorial current setting to the west. The boat is moving around a bit due to the NE waves hitting our stern port quarter, but not in any really uncomfortable way. So far on this mostly downwind trip we haven’t experienced any particularly bad sea states or boat rolling or rocking, but perhaps what is bad is a personal thing. It does seem hard to call waves generated by no more than 12 to 14 knots of wind, or even the 20 we had for a few days, particularly aggravating, even if you are getting bounced around a bit. After all, this is an ocean passage and you have to expect some motion. It is definitely not the same as being on Puget Sound.
Hopefully, for the benefit of our failing rudder, the sea state will remain as it is for the remainder of our trip. If the winds kick up from a direction that tosses the stern around it may hasten the disintegration of the fiberglass pan that holds the upper end of the rudder post in position. It is the pan itself that has failed, we discovered after getting down in the lazerettes and really inspecting it. The upper rudder bearing assembly bolts onto the pan and is held in place and stable by the pan. Nice reasonable winds from another direction that doesn’t result in wave action tossing the stern would be most welcome, so we’re talking to the wind gods, and I’m talking to Freyja in particular!
I can’t remember which day it was, but at some point Emil patiently traced all the connections and figured out that the connection of the satphone cradle antenna cord to the external antenna was no good right where the cord entered and connected to the external antenna. The installation at Marine Services was bad, they had pinched the cord and the pinch caused the cord to pull out of its termination hardware. Once he got that fixed the satphone cradle worked fine for emailing and weather downloading.
For many days now we’ve been standing our night watches in shorts and t-shirts, or perhaps with a very light long sleeve thing over our t-shirt. It is really nice and warm at night, and the moon is still doing its thing. So far we haven’t had any really great starry nights, before or after the moon, as there has been moisture in the atmosphere and a star obscuring haze around the horizon. We haven’t seen any ships or boats since leaving Mexican waters behind, except for one radar image I saw one night about 20 miles out from us and that was off the screen within about 10 minutes.
Our fresh vegetables and fruit are pretty much gone, except for a bit of lettuce that has been refrigerated all along and some carrots and beets. The harder the vegetable the better they seem to keep. I think potatoes would still be good, but we have eaten all we brought. It turns out that Dominique likes oven baked French fries and enjoys making them for us! We ate the last of the sprouts today. I’m going to get a sprout growing thing going on Freyja, especially for longer passages. They are good and tasty and fresh, and can be grown as you go.
About one or so we decided to fly the asymmetrical. Emil drug it up to the foredeck, got all the lines out, and we started hoisting it up on its halyard. Just as it reached the top of the mast the snap shackle released for some reason and the sail came down, in its ATN snuffer bag, and landed on the deck. The spinnaker halyard was lost at the top of the mast. Emil promptly got out his home made bosun’s chair. We came into the wind and lowered the mainsail, only to find that the main halyard was badly frayed about a foot from the shackle. He cut the end off, tied a bowline to the shackle, attached his bosun’s chair and up the mast he went on the electric winch, clinging to the mast with arms and legs as he went up. However, the boat was pitching and rolling so violently with no sails up that about ¾ of the way up he couldn’t hold on and started getting violently and dangerously slammed and tossed around. We quickly lowered him down, left the spinnaker halyard up at the mast top and decided to forget flying the asymmetrical sail. While all that was going on, I was steering the boat and noticing that the steering was locking up at various angles with the auto pilot in the off mode. The wheel would just freeze solid so I couldn’t turn it at all. We can’t see anything jammed up down in the area of the steering quadrant, but we're wondering if it’s related to the failing rudder perhaps torqueing the steering mechanism and jamming up the autopilot. The steering seems to work with the autopilot on, though, so once again we are headed downwind to the Marquesas. We are on an angle of sail that doesn’t cause snapping of the rudder post, and are motor sailing to pick up a couple of knots. We're going as fast as we can without audible signals from the rudder telling us that we are killing it.
The mainsail halyard chafe was instructive, as was the roller furler chafe. We had no idea it was happening. It might have taken only a few minutes to happen, maybe when reefing or un-reefing, or maybe it took days. It tells me that you have to develop a habit of inspecting your rigging on a daily basis when cruising. When shaking out the reef in the mainsail, drop it all the way and check the halyard. The daily basis thing probably isn’t going to happen, realistically, but then at least frequently. Suppose the main halyard had broken and fallen down inside the mast?
Data entry for day 16, ending the April 22 to April 23, 1pm to 1pm, 24 hour period:
24 hour Mileage towards waypoint: (764 - 645) = 119
Wind Speed: 11 knots (True)
Boat Speed at time of log entry: 5.6 knots
Wave Height/State: 3 foot wind waves, 5 foot swell
Sail Plan: 100% main, 70% unfurled of the 140% genoa
Course: 2 magnetic, 231 GPS
Barometer: 1012
Temp: 84 degrees F.
Humidity: 84%
My Handheld GPS distance to Hiva Oa: 645
Location: 03.01.635, 130.18.468
Day 17 - April 23, Saturday
Since last night we’ve been sailing along with about 11 knots of NE breeze gradually changing to E, making 5 knots or a little better. We’re heading SE to Hiva Oa, so the winds and seas are behind us at a broad reach or run type of angle. The course has to be tweaked to take pressure off the rudder – a few degrees one way or the other will change the way the stern is taking the waves and increase or decrease the rudder cracking and popping sounds and amount of play visible at the top of the rudder post. The more off course we are, the longer the trip, but the less stressful it is on us.
Too much headsail while going downwind results in it flogging at these wind speeds and with the size of the wind waves and swells. If the wind picks up, the whole 140% sail flies fine, but it is too heavy a weight of cloth for these conditions. The halyard for the asymmetrical is still up at the top of the mast. There is so much swing in the mast as the boat rolls around that it is dangerous to go up there for something that isn’t mission critical. It would be nice to have a couple of spare halyards rigged for whatever eventualities cause you to need one – chaff, accident, whatever. It would be nice to have a spare halyard for the main, too, or at least a messenger string somehow rigged so you could pull a new main halyard up if the need arose.
The amount of wear and tear on the boat in these pretty benign conditions is amazing, and I can only imagine what it would be like if conditions were stronger for a period of days. The twisting, banging, rolling, stretching, etc., 24/7, really tests the quality of construction of the boat and of all the gear on it. Anything that can rub and wear will quickly do so.
The crew is starting to talk about what day we will get to Atuona, the principal city on Hiva Oa, and the place where we will check into the country. With just over 600 miles to go we can start guessing our arrival day. We are guessing that our arrival will be on Thursday or Friday, or maybe Saturday. Apparently, if you get there after 5 pm on Friday you are supposed to stay on your boat in quarantine until Monday morning when customs and immigration open back up, which really isn’t a pleasant prospect. Maybe the other puddle jumpers will have compassion and stop by in their dingys with baguettes and ice cold local beers. And, if we have an after 5 pm Friday arrival, there will be the pressure to get off the boat anyhow, disrespecting the local laws and customs…..and maybe running into Monday morning’s immigration officer at the bar on Saturday night….
We have left the beautiful equatorial clouds behind and sailed into a zone with slightly more mundane clouds. The equatorial clouds were so energetic, so towering, each one trying to outdo the other in terms of height and complexity and sculptured patterns.
The very large stash of beautiful exotic cheeses that we have in the bottom of the refrigerator is slowing emerging. They are so delicious and in perfect shape. I had a nice piece of toasted Orowheat bread with a thick slice of a beautiful blue cheese on it for breakfast, with a few drops of olive oil added to the toast. It was washed down with our beautiful French Pressed dark roasted Nayarit coffee. The cous cous that we bought two large containers of at Costco is a big hit, too, as you can cook a pot full and have it ready to go cold. It works as a filling for burritos, with eggs, with salad, with fresh fish stirred in, it’s a great tasty filler.
I was pulling my handline in last night around 8, just as my watch was starting and, lo, there was a little 5 or 6 pound tuna on the line. He had the most beautiful electric blue colors. He must have been dragging for a while so didn’t fight much as I brought him to hand. We are still standing watch in t-shirts and shorts, unless because of a lot of wind we need a windbreaker. The t-shirt is more to keep the sun off than for warmth. We had a nice salad last night. The lettuce in the refer is still going strong.
Data entry for day 17, ending the April 23 to April 24, 1pm to 1pm, 24 hour period:
24 hour Mileage towards waypoint: (645 - 505) = 140
Wind Speed: 20 knots (True)
Boat Speed at time of log entry: 7.2 knots
Wave Height/State: 8 foot wind waves/swells close together
Sail Plan: 1st reef main, 30% unfurled of the 140% genoa
Course: 223 magnetic, 230 GPS
Barometer: 1014
Temp: 84 degrees F.
Humidity: 87%
My Handheld GPS distance to Hiva Oa: 505
Location: 04.24.710, 132.12.042
Day 18 - April 24, Sunday
Twenty knots of wind, Force 5 on the Beaufort scale. Every once in a while a wave sprays into the cockpit. Luckily the temperature is right up there so we are warm even in this wind. We had a lot of new noises from the steering system last night. We think that the torqueing rudder shaft is damaging the autopilot, maybe getting the autopilot ram out of alignment. The whole thing is working really hard. We were prancing along pretty overpowered at 8+ knots last night before we got it together to reef the sails. The first reef doesn’t seem to take much area out of this Catalina stock mainsail.
Data entry for day 18, ending the April 24 to April 25, 1pm to 1pm, 24 hour period:
24 hour Mileage towards waypoint: (505 - 350) = 155
Wind Speed: 20 knots (True)
Boat Speed at time of log entry: 7.1 knots
Wave Height/State: 8 foot wind waves/swells
Sail Plan: Two reefs in main, 30% unfurled
Course: 200 magnetic, 2 GPS
Barometer: 1015
Temp: 88 degrees F.
Humidity: 92%
My Handheld GPS distance to Hiva Oa: 350
Location: 05.50.027, 134.23.557
Day 19 - April 25, Monday
We sailed along all night with 20 knots or so of wind, which lasted well into this morning. The moon is still doing its thing, though there is a concave curve to it. There was a lot of discussion about the sea state. We are out in the ocean, there is only twenty knots of wind blowing, there is about 3,000 miles of fetch, the waves are all from the same direction, and we are slightly close hauled. It wasn’t really bad at all compared to what’s possible with the other moods of the ocean. It was a bit more of a rough ride than you find in Puget Sound, I suppose. We are smelling the barn and anxious to get to it.
Data entry for day 19, ending the April 25 to April 26, 1pm to 1pm, 24 hour period:
24 hour Mileage towards waypoint: (350 - 208) = 142
Wind Speed: 6.0 knots (True)
Boat Speed at time of log entry: 16 knots
Wave Height/State: 8 foot wind/swells
Sail Plan: 2nd reef in main, 50% unfurled genoa
Course: 2 magnetic, 230 GPS
Barometer: 1013
Temp: 83 degrees F.
Humidity: 85%
My Handheld GPS distance to waypoint/Hiva Oa: 208
Location: 07.31.480, 136.03.853
Day 20 - April 26, Tuesday
Last night and today we have had multiple autopilot failures of various natures. Sometimes the boat starts spinning around in circles, sometimes it just starts wandering, but either way when you turn the autopilot off the helm is locked up rigidly, and you can’t steer the boat at all, the wheel just won’t move one inch. We have rebooted the autopilot, turned off all power at the breaker panel, and tried other software tricks but it won’t release the helm. So far we have been able to get it working again by turning the autopilot back on. The first time it happened yesterday evening we were stuck heading for Antarctica at 6 knots for an hour or so, which was an odd feeling if you let your paranoid fantasies play out. It is losing its mind more and more frequently, changing from once or twice a day to every 20 minutes to every 10 minutes. Tomorrow afternoon, which is hopefully our last daytime at sea, we will pull the pin connecting the autopilot ram to the rudder post. That should let us steer by hand overnight and the next morning. We expect to make landfall in the middle of the night very early Thursday morning, so will have to have hand steering to tack back and forth off shore and for entering the harbor. The autopilot is a Raymarine ST6002G, the stock, Catalina chosen, unit for this boat.
We called Raymarine technical support this morning. There was about a 10 minute wait on hold on the Satphone, which is a bit expensive. They are suggesting that the clutch is failing and sticking, which in turn prevents the autopilot from letting go of the helm when we go to standby mode or power off mode. Their closest dealer and service facility is in Hawaii.
We have, for the past couple of days, had a nice steady 15 to 20 knot breeze out of the S to SE. The S part is a bit surprising, as the GRIB files all show the wind from the E. Also, our Raymarine C80 shows a 2.5 knot current setting to the SSE, which is counterintuitive to me, given the steady and powerful trades blowing just the opposite direction. If true, though, it might explain the slightly lumpy nature of the seas – wind against current. The cloud cover is a sort of plebian set of small and not very active looking cumulus clouds, sort of low. Sea haze on the horizon at nights, and the stars were at least 50% obscured last night on my watch. We’re seeing lots of 4 to 6 inch long flying fish, but not finding them on deck.
This evening we disconnected the autopilot ram from the rudder post, instead of waiting until tomorrow. The Raymarine ST6002G completely failed us. We were turning in random complete circles, or holding course for the south pole, or basically heading where ever it felt like sending us. The wheel came free as soon as the ram was disconnected and as a side benefit the rudder is much quieter. We’re thinking that manual steering is much softer than autopilot steering, as the helmsman lets the wheel have a bit of natural motion as opposed to the rigid control of the autopilot. The human puts a little extra “give” in the system. This makes me suspect that a windvane steering system would likewise be easier on the rudder assembly, whether it is like my Fleming (which uses lines to the helm to control the ship’s rudder) or a hydrovane type that has its own rudder.
I raised Blue Moon on the VHF today. It was nice to hear another boat after all these days of silence. They were just a few miles from us, and were also heading for Atuona. I miss the SSB/ham connection, and would never want to be at sea again without it. While the satphone is nice to call family and sailing support people (Raymarine, etc.), actually quite invaluable, the radio connects you to the real players in the sailing community - the actual sailors out in the ocean sailing along with you. With the radio you make new friends and keep in touch with old ones, and you are connected to events important to you – weather, check in procedures, other boats in distress that you might help, the upcoming rendezvous at a certain anchorage or island….. The other negative about the satphone is the astounding cost of regular operations. I can’t believe the cost per minute of phone calls and the shockingly large amount of airtime minutes you are charged for downloading weather on top of the basic flat fee charged for each weather chart. The ham radio may cost a bit more initially if you just walk into a retail store and ask for a full package including installation, but after that it is essentially free. There are some good values in used radio gear on craigslist or at QRZ.com. If you are handy you can do a lot of the installation work yourself and save money there too. The satphone is mostly an expensive luxury, but that said it does add a layer of safety and convenience, plus you can call your mom and wish her happy birthday. Very nice to have both! Hands down, no question, get the radio first. If I was in a life raft, I’d want a satphone with me.
Data entry for day 20, ending the April 26 to April 27, 1pm to 1pm, 24 hour period:
24 hour Mileage towards waypoint: (208 - 78 ) = 130
Wind Speed: 18 knots (True)
Boat Speed at time of log entry: 6.6 knots
Wave Height/State: 8 foot wind/swell waves
Sail Plan: 2nd reef main, 80% unfurled of the 140% genoa
Course: 220 magnetic, 234 GPS
Barometer: 1013
Temp: 83 degrees F.
Humidity: 86%
My Handheld GPS distance to Hiva Oa: 78
Location: 08.59.714, 137.42.337
Day 21 - April 27, Wednesday
We arrived offshore of Atuona harbor at maybe 3 or 4 am, so we sailed around randomly in light breezes in the dark, waiting for daylight to enter the harbor. There was another sailboat doing the same thing. They had their tricolor on, but it must have been an old one as the colors weren’t visible and it looked more like an anchor light. I couldn’t tell the red side from the green side from the white stern light. The moon had set, and I was steering. It was so dark that all I could see of this boat was its white looking tricolor. For some reason, that very white-ish tricolor gave me no depth perception and I couldn’t tell how far away it was. They finally came on the radio and said that as we were motor sailing (we had our steaming light on) that they had the right of way and I’d better turn as they were really close. Sure enough, they emerged from the gloom just 50 yards away on a collision course. So I turned away. I prefer sidelights and a stern light when close in to shore, as they are easier to see and allow one to better judge the location of the boat displaying them.
We dropped anchor about 7 or 8 this morning. There were 19 other sailboats anchored ahead of us, and the big local interisland freighter/passenger ship, Aranui 3, was also tied up at the pier unloading general cargo. This is a fairly tight little anchorage with 19 boats in it, and with the freighter forcing us all to stay behind a line marked with two yellow Xs. Emil scouted out a nice hole to park in towards the beach and the jetty side, vacated moments before by a departing catamaran. We dropped the bow anchor, and then the stern anchor to match the prevailing anchoring technique at this anchorage. Sometimes at night a wind comes down the valley and really messes with the boats and the stern anchor is used to keep everybody from banging into each other.
We all jumped into the dingy and headed to shore to check in. The dingy dock is rough and abrasive. A lot of the dingys used stern anchors to hold themselves off of the concrete quay. My girlfriend Judy was waiting on the dock. She had flown to the Marquesas to join us on Shanti for the trip to Tahiti. Judy had met Sandra, the check in agent who contracts with our agent Cindy in Tahiti to handle the Marquesas end of the check in, several days before and made friends with her, so Judy and Sandra were waiting with Sandra’s car at the dingy pier to take us to the gendarme to check in. Checking in was easy, nobody came to the boat for a custom’s inspection, nor to any of the other boats as far as I’ve heard. We hung out at Snack Make Make for some Hino Tahitian beers, which were cold and excellent and 5% alcohol. Not having eaten for about 24 hours, I had a delicious but not very fancy omelet, too, which cost 20,000 XPF. The same omelet would have been maybe $6 at home. What a pleasure to sit on land and eat food somebody else made and from ingredients that weren’t on the boat! And, oh, was the icy cold beer ever good……
Judy had taken a room in the beautiful Pearl Hotel, overlooking the harbor, so after the beers and omelet she and I headed straight for it while Emil and Dominique went somewhere, maybe back to the boat or to wherever sailors go who don’t have an awesome hotel suite waiting for them. After being up all night, and after the several very relaxing Hino’s I had, I fell fast asleep on the great big king size bed, with the A/C on a gentle mild not too cold temperature. Well, first I took a beautiful shower in the beautiful open air enormous hardwood and stone shower stall that had an endless supply of soap and water available, and then spent a few minutes more looking out over the sailboats in the harbor and into the jagged dark brooding knife edged mountains of Hiva Oa. Oh, did that big bed feel good as I slipped off to a blissful sleep………… The Pearl is nice. The rooms are actually individual cabins, set in beautiful landscaped grounds….
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