The saga continues, the winds and swell have not abated, and now, it seems, we are in squall alley. Over the past six hours we have had as many squalls. They approach from the east behind us, the clouds darken and streaks of rain lash the sea, the wind becomes lighter and changes direction, and …
Well the seas have now built to the predicted 3.7m swell with winds of 20-30 knots and we were hit by our first squall on my night watch. Fortunately, we have been sailing very conservatively with a poled out, reefed staysail upwind and a triple reefed genoa on the boom downwind. It makes it very …
Today we reached the 13 degree latitude having chosen to go south as it may help us avoid some of the wilder weather north of us. We are the yellow dot on the tracking map so, as the smallest boat, we are doing very well compared to our fellow Vikings. The fast group north of …
Last night was an incredibly beautiful night. Before the moon rose the stars gave just enough light to show the horizon between inky black sea and deep grey sky. The stars gave a dazzling display and phosphorescence reflected from the water. Merryn glided through the waves with only the sound of the surf. We’ve settled …
Today is beautiful, warm and sunny with cotton wool puffs of fair-weather cloud dotting the sky. The seas feel calmer although the swell is 2.5m, and we have a following wind of 15 knots blowing us westwards. We have kept the same sail plan so Jonathan hasn’t had to do any scary boat gymnastics on …
Last night was pure torture. It was quite windy so we reefed but this left us at the mercy of giant waves from two directions turning us off course and pushing us into deep troughs. The slamming of waves and sail and the huge rolling pitches made sleep impossible. Apart from insomnia all was …
After a great deal of deliberation we set off as planned this morning. The near and long range forecast is for a windy crossing in Force 5 to 7. That should be fine as it is mainly downwind sailing and the boat should perform well. Unfortunately there is also a 3-4m short time period swell …
Today will be our final leg of stage 1. We have been sailing with caution in force 4 to 6 winds taking as much care as possible not to damage the boat or ourselves. Of the 22 boats in the Vikings Explorers rally three have torn their downwind sails, one has a slow leak and …
Well, the forecast ‘easing’ of the weather did not happen. Last night the seas continued to build with a combination of swell from the NW due to north Atlantic weather patterns and swell from the NE due to more local winds. The winds continued at 22 knots gusting up to 27 knots and the seas …
Last night our ideal downwind sail set-up took an early demise. The mounting seas and wind astern had us surfing and corkscrewing down the waves, putting a lot of strain on our genoa and spinnaker pole which gave up with a bang. I was snoozing down below and heard the bang but Jonathan, listening to …