Tommy - Log 11 - Fast and Fruity

The winds have been extremely kind the last few days and with our special JJ Simbo rig set-up we are sailing at top speed knocking off those miles. Although, I’ve woken up to Squall City. Just as I get up on deck we’re about to hit a massive squall. Life jackets on. Everyone is called up on deck. The rain starts peltering in. The wind is erratic and changes direction. We reef in the main and twin head sails. Jason is on the helm and all that is left to do is ride it out in true riders of the squall style, hoping we’re near the end of it.Annnddd… we’ve made it through the squall but there are several others lurching around. I pop the radar on as it picks up the squalls like giant blobs of evil custard floating around on the screen. The one we have escaped is moving round to the South of. read more...

Tommy - Log 10 - Moonshine

I feel ridiculous, it’s 12:30am just after my night watch and the moon is shining directly into the cabin hatch. It’s open allowing the breeze to swoop in and glide down to the tip of our toes. The further West we sail, the warmer it’s getting at all times of day and night, making this breeze at night vital to sleep.  The moonshine so bright I can’t sleep, so I’m lying with sunglasses on! Ridiculous but it worked, finally got to sleep. The rig set-up we have at the moment with twin head sails allows us to sail almost directly downwind and angle ourselves more or less in line with St Lucia but it’s also proving to be extremely noisy at night when all you want and need is some rest and all you can hear are the sails, poles, boom, mast, blocks and cars flapping, tweaking, twisting. read more...

Tommy - Log - 9 - Good things come to those who wait

We’ve just had one of our top 5 dinners, our take on the traditional fish and chips with mushy peas. And yes we FINALLY caught and landed a fish!  It was a Mahi Mahi / Dorado, over a meter long. We just couldn't believe it, good things definitely come to those who wait….. patiently.  We were patient and persevered and eventually landed a whopper! It was magnificent, electric blue polka dots, with a yellow shimmer and enough food for at least 3 generous meals. Stu and Jason did a fantastic job bringing this wonderful creature on board. Coincidentally, we had 8nm to go until our official half way point and we heard the fishing reel spinning into a frenzy. It was meant to be, a significant sign of our half way point.For our first fish supper, Jason made white fillets in garlic and. read more...

Tommy - Log 8 4-3-4

I feel rude having not formally introduced Karla properly however the entire situation of crew has been all a bit raw. 2 days before the start of the ARC 2017, before sailing 3000 miles across the Atlantic Ocean, we were seriously let down by a crew mate. It was such a blow, especially given the short notice. I think we were all a bit in shock for a few hours and then like a sprinkle of serendipity this young woman was standing on the floating pontoon asking if we needed crew. Now, we’ve always said that we’d never sail with a random and in Gran Canaria you are literally approached and asked about 4 times a day if crew are needed and throughout our whole 5 weeks there we turned away many hopefuls. Now a little piece of each us were considering it. Stu, Jason and I had. read more...

Tommy - Log 7 - Flying

It literally feels like we are flying along at 8-10 knots, we’re watching the speedometer increase by the second. I’d say we each spend at least 30% of our day glued to the ever changing boat speed digits, organically taking shifts to monitor boat speed vs. wind speed and direction. Trimming sails accordingly to get the perfect balance. We get excited at anything over 8 knots now as we’ve been so use to plodding along at figures much less.   We’re determine to average 7 nm per hour which will enable us to keep up with our planned route. We have become obsessed with the speedo. I've popped in a waypoint and given ourselves 5 days to get there, we are now on day 3 and pretty much bang on target. Once we get to the waypoint in a couple of days we will then be on the home stretch to St. read more...