Wednesday19th March
LIFE BEGINS AT 40!
Barry - I knew that I would be turning 40 during the passage from Galapagos to Marquesas, but had given the significance of the date little thought. I guess that the adventure we are currently undertaking has somewhat overshadowed what would otherwise be a major milestone. I wonder if that was in the back of my mind when I decided to extend my trip beyond the ARC passage in November into a 5-month odyssey. I woke up this morning to a saloon decorated with balloons and a large cut-out multi coloured letters reminding me of my new age, just in case it had slipped my mind. The guys have been great and have very kindly given me a day off, which has allowed me write today's log. A special thanks to Lindsey for arranging the pod of 40 pilot whales to arrive at 1800, they spent about 20 minutes surfing around the boat, it was quite something. As JB said, someone was looking down on me to make sure this was a special day, and I think I know who that was. A big thank you to JB, Lindsey, Robert and Malkey for a great day and a great trip so far. Thanks also for the birthday wishes and messages of consolation!
Main outhaul failure and other sailing news - Last night, just as were
sitting down to HoiSin Wahoo with boiled potatoes and mung sprouts, there
was a loud bang from the boom, quickly followed by a second loud twang.
Malkey went forward to check the mast and fore-deck rigging while the rest
of us kept an eye on him and checked the boom and aft-rigging. JB and
Lindsey quickly spotted that the clew of the main was raised from the boom
and that the end of the outhaul was caught by the stopper knot. It turned
out that the outhaul car had disintegrated and it took us, thanks primarily
to Malkey's tenacity, the best part of 60 minutes to rig a replacement
strop. The main is an in-mast furling system with vertical batons and as we
furled it, the foot rose off the boom, which caused the main to gather and
jam in the mast. It took a huge effort and an overheated primary winch to
clear the jam. The night was fairly uneventful, except for the girls, they
had a close encounter with another WARC yacht Akoya. They were doing about
9.5kts to our 7.5 and overhauled us with ease. JB called them up for a chat
and both girls got very excited when the Italian skipper responded.
Unfortunately, their efforts at striking up a mid Pacific conversation were
met with "Ehhhh, you speak more slowly, little English I have!". Early this
morning we poled out the Yankee in order to allow us to hold a more downwind
course. We are currently on the lay-line for the Marquesas, which is a good
thing; however, we are sailing at about 140degrees off the wind, which is a
slow point of sailing and leads to a significant amount of yawing and
rolling. We are going to stand on like this for a while and see if the wind
backs to the East as expected, which will allow us a better wind angle to
fly our down-wind twistle rig. Robert, served up a delicious selection of
smoked salmon wraps. We were just about to sit down to dinner when we were
all brought on deck by a loud twang, the yankee sheet had worn through at
the spinnakerr pole. Unfortunately, the yankee got itself into an awful
twist as it was furled, which took about an hour to clear. Robert's chicken
caserole was well received after our efforts on deck as was JB's awesome
chocolate birthday cake, decorated with mandarines and maltesers.
A new watch system - The watch system has been a keenly debated topic aboard
Quasar. Even more so after a single watch rota was adopted due to the
comfortable sailing conditions. In order to bring the discussion to a head
and simplify the process, I decided to exercise birthday-boy privileges and
arrange tonight's watch schedule. To which end, I came up with the following
formula:
[(Litre's of wine on board Quasar) ^ (No. Of skippers on board) * (Robert's
BMI volatility)] / [(Quasar's Gross Displacement (Imperial)) * [(Quasar's
Ballast (Imperial)) ^ (Half life of Uranium 235)]
This formula has both variable and fixed elements, which reflects the
dynamic nature of long distance passage making. The rate of change of
certain elements, such as volume of wine on board will have to be closely
monitored, and a volatility index for Robert's BMI (body mass index) will
also have to be calculated on a daily basis. Note the use of the Uranium 235
isotope and not the 265 isotope that you may have thought more appropriate.
I really think that I am on to something here, but I have not quite figured
out what to do with the result of this calculation, so in the mean-time we
will have a rolling two hour on, eight hour off system running from 2200
until 0800.
A note on sprouting - Our efforts at sprouting seeds on board Quasar have
proved a great success. We now have a daily supply of alfalfa, mung, aduki,
rocket, mustard, broccoli, radish or fenugreek sprouts to augment our
diminishing fresh vegetable supply. None of us had tried sprouting our own
seeds on board before and are now totally converted to the cause. It was a
good thing that Argentinean customs decided not to confiscate my supply of
sprouting seeds. They are proving a great addition to wraps, salads and
sprinkled on our main evening meals.
JB's home brew in the fosc'le - JB has always been one of the strongest
opponents of Robert's dry boat policy, and despite the embargo having being
lifted, I suspect that she has been attempting to brew her own illicit stash
in the fosc'le. Her last two experiments appear to have had mixed results:
after having successfully melted a bag of potatoes under her bunk, the
resulting mash fermented and turned into a putrid mess, the second attempt
showed early promise; until, one of the watermelons, she had been sleeping
with since the Galapagos, had terminal structural failure at 0357 on the
17th and melted through the fosc'le floorboards into the bilge. The 5 tubes
of croissant dough that expanded, burst and turned green must have been some
sort of experimental yeast culture, but she is remaining tight lipped about
this.
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