Easter Comes and Goes

Like so many of the passing's in lifes calenders, Easter marks a special time, and for those on board Xplore it was as well.

The only difference is that we spent this special time at Easter Island ! not quite on the same date as the rest of the world but it marked a specail mile stone in our Pacific crossing.

The day was hot and virtually windless when we arrived so that by the time we had droped the anchor in the bay of Hanga Roa most dived straight into the clear 26 C waters to cool down.

We enjoyed 3 days there is this remote Chilean island of the South Pacific, renowned for their Moi rock statues that surround the island's coast.

The team had one full day on shore, as the other's were taken up with the "Work List" topping up the fuel tanks useing a local open fishing boat, minor stiching on sails, provisioning and general re-tidy.

Bob's wife Lyn was also there at the shore line waiting for Xplore, and she now makes up our full team of 8 that continue across to New Zealand, hopefully with a brief stop at Pitcairn island which currently lies 346 nautical miles due west of our current position.

More relaxed news to come Stephen

Like a bat out of hell

As if the gates of heaven opened, the chains that held us to Tierra del Fuego broke into dust and the sweet air of the ocean started to fill our lungs.

From when we left the anchorage of the Straits of Magellan four and a half days ago we have travelled 596 nautical miles, which makes an average speed of 5.5 knots, now to any sailor, that is not very fast for a 67 foot yacht !

The route which we travelled was not straight by a long shot, it had twists and turns, some round parts and some curved but the actual distance that we should of taken was 402 nautical miles, so one might ask is the skipper deranged or was there another factor that brought this about?

The slip out of the straits through the centre of the low did work well, the weather system that we had after that was not that well.

Out of the 4 nights we had to hove too for 3 of them (to stop the boat whilst at sea) . The counter currents along the Chilean coast made the seas even well off shore where we were like a washing machine, so even when we had boat speed, we were stopped dead by the continual hobby horsing and gyrations that Xplore made each time as we came over a wave crest.

A few technical, mechanical and sails issues also kept the speed down, and the atmosphere cool along with the temperature, the team on board was also settling into their own rhythm and routines along with their sea legs.

But like all sailors know, ever day and ever watch can be so totally different, and we at last saw what we wanted in the prognostic weather charts....... the re-emergence of the South Pacific High Pressure Cell!!

From late morning yesterday we have seen the back of the South, hell has been closed and heaven awaits those who are patient.

Our mileage that we have travelled in less than 24 hours, in the right direction has changed the faces of everyone on board.

So like a bat out of hell, we'll be coming on back to you

Stephen

Fasten your seat belts !

Fasten your seat belts !

The southern ocean will always have a mystique and awe about it.

The sea faring stories that have been written about the roaring forties,
furious fifties and the screaming sixties in the past only have changed in
that the type and style of the boats are hopefully a lot better... we hope.

Our departure from the shores of Tierra Del Fuego and the western reaches of
the Straits of Magellan was something of a feat, long hours mulling over the
possibility to sail direct into open ocean or to use the inside channels 400
nautical miles up the coast and then to exit further north from the Gulf De
Penas.

I was happy with either way, but with each of these options there were draw
backs, pluses and minuses.

The prevailing winds are from the NW to SW, and here in this part of the
world you NEVER try to fight against the winds.

The inside channel route is some what protected, but as we found out on the
day before departure that our Cmap electronic chart package that we had just
installed on the boat navigation computer had some serious flaws in their
coverage. These were to compliment our collection of paper charts on board
and play an important part of the total navigation safety picture.

After paying $200USD for just this Chilean section, I was furrious with what
they had supplied us, it was virging on the case of suicide to only navigate
these twisting channels with them alone. I wasnt happy !

The option to sail direct into open ocean, and then north made a lot of
sense, BUT you need to right conditions and wind direction to be able to do
this, as this western side of Tierra Del Fuego is as ferocious as Cape Horn.

The night of the 20th we sat in our anchorage off the side of Magellan, and
I had my head deep in mixed thoughts. We had known for over 4 days that a
substantial low pressure system was going to come across from the Pacific
and take its normal path track around Tierra del Fuego and Cape Horn, the
prognosis was for extreme winds on the front reaching higher than 60 knots.

If the low didnt track too much to the SE then we may have a small window to
exit Magellan and cross through the centre and then take the Southerly winds
north on the western side of the low, lots of ifff's and But's about this.

I slept with mixed dreams and woke early as any anxious skipper does, down
loaded some new weather information and looked at the satelite image, hmmm
this low is just about stationary and coming right across the top of us.

To not take this oportunity (and many would say that there is nothing
opportunistic about sailing through the centre of a big low prressure cell)
but here in the south you also learn that some of the calmest conditions
happen in the centre of a low, well thats untill you get out from the
centre.

Many coffee's and reflective thinking I saw that this chance to move was the
best, to not take could mean that we would be stuck there in the south for
another 4 to 5 days potentially, not a great thought as autum and winter is
drawing closer, the days already cut substantially.

The howling winds from the eastern side of the low started to ease early
afternoon, we made our break, but didnt really know what the Straits would
be like untill we exited our hiddy hole ?

What we found and what we saw was amazing, flat smooth seas, low wind, and a
clear passage North West, Xplore was prepared and ready for the Pacific.

In the 2 days since leaving the Straites of Magellan we have had some tough
but fast sailing, winds into the mid 40's have kept everyone on their toes,
rough starts arent the best for settling the stomaches of people but overall
the team has survived in a sterling fashion.

As we tear along 65 miles miles off the coast steering due north we all long
for the warmth of some sun and calmer conditions

Blow and Go

Well, the life of a sailor is very much about patience, waiting for everything, the winds to turn, the seas to ease, the crew to arrive, the passengers to leave.

We are waiting at the moment in the very western reaches of the Straits of Magellan, much further west than I have ever been before in Tierra Del Fuego, and our waiting plan is all about a low pressure system.

In my years down here I have seen many a low blow through, some small and many very large, and this one that we wait for has to be classified as one of those large ones !

With the Grib files showing average wind strengths in the 60 knot range we know that gusts could be much higher. So in our travels out to this location we needed to find a good bolt hole that would give us protection.

As the name of the yacht is Xplore, we once again did just that, explored and found another new anchorage to hide away in.

If you have that chance Google this Latitude and Longitude and you can see where we are, and named it "Caleta Julie" as it was crew member Julie's birthday the day that we found this place.

53 07.995 South 73 36.250 West

The blow should last for 2 days, but indication have it easing on the morning of the 22nd where we may be able to sail out of Magellan and then head north to more temperate climates and the start of our Pacific crossing.

Stephen

A hoy, what you doing up there ?

Finding yourself hanging 2/3rds of the way up the forestay off the Antarctic coast with a bitterly cold southerly wind and a three meter sea needs some explanation, about one sanity, and reason for finding yourself in such a position.

Well, where do you start, a sailor knows that some things need to be done, its not a case that certain things can wait, its a case of do it right, do it now, and do it fast, and this was certainly one of those situations.

I had been mulling over our weather window to leave Antarctica after a grand voyage along the white continent coasts line. This trip in February had dealt us a very mixed selection of weather, which also made it that much harder topic the perfect time to leave, too early and we miss precious time in this special white play ground, and too late and the plans,flights and future of everyone on board becomes a messy chess game.

The day of the 24th presented itself with an opportunity, any later would be dicey, and the only thing that was a question mark was the 35 knots of wind forecast for the first night out.

We headed up the Gerlach Strait, with sails flying, a following wind with clear sunny breaks. North of Brabant Island we turned and met with the ocean swell and the promise of a relatively quick but not too bumpy re-crossing of the Drake.

Being my 26th time of crossing the drake I am certainly used to its peculiarities and its temperament, something that no sailor here in the south would ever, ever take for granted, drop your guard for a moment and it will kick your ass so hard you will have nightmares about it for years.

We knew we were expecting wind, a good direction, but as February days are so much shorter now one has to take the lack of visibility and light into account carefully. Audrey and I were on the first of the night watches and we had already reefed down the main sail to 4 tucks, the head sails were virtually non existent as we saw the tell tail signs of a fast changing low pressure system sliding directly over the top of Xplore.

The barometer had been dropping all day and now was 20 millibars lower than what we started, at 958, we knew that it was going to change, probably fast and from a totally different direction, and that it did !

Within minutes of the wind grinding to a holt, as if someone had closed the front door of the house, the back door swung open, and a right feral monster was waiting out the back. 20 30 then 40 knots the winds started blowing, 50 and then 60, shit this is wild !

The winds were not from the West / South West as proposed but from the direct SOUTH, and in Antarctica every one learns very fast that anything from the south is COLD, very cold.

The decision to stop and hove too didn't take long to make, from a skippers perspective I am sure you can see what I mean, boat speed is 9 to 10 knots, visibility doesn't exist as its pitch black, and even if there was some light, the strength of the wind mixed with ice and snow means you cant look at anything anyway. Couple that with the fact that you have a boat which is your life line to the world with 12 people on board and there is a great potential that there are ice bergs around.

Stop and stop fast !

Having too is a traditional mariners way of virtually stopping the boat whilst at sea, it brings calm to the boat if positioned correctly to the seas, not often able to be used on modern fast and fancy plastic boats these days, but here in the south this is something that we regularly use when the going gets just a tad too tough........ like now!

Instead of being a comforting smooth stopped motion by hoving too, Xplore and my fine bunch of feather friends (as I quite often call them) had been whacked onto spin mode in the washing machine. For myself, Audrey and Julie the key crew we are all quite used to this, but the stomachs started to turn pretty fast for the fathered bunch.

But situations like these need concentration and as boss I wasn't concerned about what was happening in the boat, but what was happening outside of the boat !

Southerly strong blows in Antarctic if they are fed with a moist air stream from the ocean means lots of snow and ice in the winds, and this is exactly what we were getting, and for a mariner we call this "Icing" yep a bit like a cake top.

Icing looks really pretty, but on a boat if it happens, and has a lot of snow, then the weight of the snow can if this continues for longer periods dramatically effect the stability of the boat, so you can understand that from my perspective, I didn't really care if anyone was sea sick at the moment, whether their pillows weren't fluffed up, but I certainly was very conscious ad cautious about what and where we were, and what was likely to happen ?

We knew that this Low pressure cell was going to move over us fast, and the barometer was already moving up fast, but a fast rise is a bad as a fast drop, and the 65 knots that we were currently experiencing I was hoping that we weren't going to see any stronger.

We all know the saying that "Every day is a different one" and for sailor we definitely agree with this, it just that for sailors we measure a day by each of the watches that we do, one 4 hour period can be horrendous, and then after a sleep the next can be like a bed of roses, calm sunny and tranquil.

I was woken by the ON watch to be told that the winds had dropped, I had already felt it in my snug bunk that I refer to as the "Cave" positioned back aft on the boat we really feel the swell and the movement when things change. I slipped up on deck and confirmed that our hove too position needed to be change, we had to get under sail, and stop playing around like a cork in the ocean.

We beared away and flopped the head sail over to the correct side so that we could gain boat speed, the winds were still 30 to 35 knots, but gusting 40, really quite calm compared to what we had during the bleak hours of darkness !

As we started to make speed the ice and snow that had built up in the mast,spreaders and rigging began clanging down on the deck and our heads,luckily most of it had already turned soft from the wintry sunny morning.

We settled the boat onto a beam reach (winds 90 degrees to our heading) and I decided to put out just a small amount of the second larger head sail called the yankee to give us a little more speed and stability. Crew at the ready on deck we slowly eased the lines and winched in the sheets to control it, but at that moment we were hit with another 40 knots or so of wind. Within seconds the lazy sheet that sits idle on the opposite side of the boat started snaking in the air, and with enough slack in it, it started whipping like a demon, crack crack at everything in its way. Seconds can seem like hours, but seconds it took and the proud and strong No 2 yankee was torn completely in half.

With team speed and reaction we turned off the pilot and headed down wind to reduce the pressure on the sail, to furl it there and then was the only option. I was gob smacked and shocked, speechless and angry $%#%#&&^%(^&*()&%& came from my mouth like someone had used me as some type of a ventriloquist act on TV.

We gathered our self's and not a lot was said, we were only just off the Antarctic coast and had a long way back to South America and one of our most important sails was in tatters. There's not a lot you can do with a blown head sail in 35 plus knots of wind, I hadn't slept for nearly 24 hours but the show had to go on. We turned on the main engine to give us the extra speed needed to controllably move through the large 4 meter swells that had built during the night, nothing much else I could really do.

Exhausted and devastated I asked the watch to wake me in a couple of hours, maybe my soft pillow would give me comfort and some idea's.

My pillow was comfortable but my dreams weren't, a few hours can make a big difference though and I climbed up on deck with a hot cup of tea and consumed at least 3 cigarettes before the plan unfolded, we had 600 nautical miles (about 1,100 Kms) to get to Ushuaia an we need to do it pretty quickly. The Drake doesn't let people or boats sit around for long in one place before reminding them who's boss.

The head sail had to come down so we at first turned down wind, to unfurl it and then ease the halyard which holds it up, slowly slowly doe it weeased the lines and watched to ripped remains flap and wiggle in the winds, bit by bit it unwound until................ shit ! Where the tear from leech to luff horizontally across the sail 2/3rds up our towering mast the internal rope call the leech line had broken and wrapped it self around the forestay and the top section of the sail ##^%$%^%(*^(&)&(& God this language seems to be the basis of my day !

We refurled the sail again, and I once again sat and smoked another 3 cigarettes. The dread of what I knew needed to be done was all too apparent, before we could do anything to salvage this sail we had to get it down, and that was impossible here in deck. I also knew that if we motor sailed all the way back to Ushuaia that what remained of the sail up the mast would most likely look nothing like a sail after 4 or 5 more days at sea. The other factor that had to be taken was if we didn't get this sail down then we couldn't hoist another sail to replace it, and then that would mean a very slow trip back with everyone on board missing their flights back to the other corners of the world.

Dread and a healthy dose of Dutch Courage, I sat down and explained to Audrey and the team what needed to be done and our options, well there wasn't really any option, it had to come down, and the forecast was for increasing winds later in the day, this moment was probably going to be the only chance to get the sail down and replaced if there ever was going to be
one.

So there we are, swinging around like a koala bear clutching to a gum tree in a storm 2/3rds the way up the forestay, knowing that if I let go at any moment then my brains would be cracked in pieces by the forestay or the inner forestay, well at least if I passed out I wouldn't feel too much pain.

The long side of the story is good, I did get up to the cut point of the sail and cut away the leech line that was stopping us from unfurling the sail so it could be lowered. I am not ashamed to say that I screamed a bit towards the end of being up there, as the blood streams in my brain were about to explode.

I am so proud of Audrey, Nigel and Justin who worked side by side with me on deck and made sure that I did get down in one piece, along with the sail.

I lay on my back still in my climbing harness for at least 10 minutes, I couldn't move. With a bit of time I found some energy and lifted myself from the deck, I didn't smoke 3 cigarettes at once (that's how bad I was feeling ) but we tidied the deck and put the sad and twisted No 2 yankee to bed.

But the job wasn't finished, we had won the first part of the battle and the confidence to win again was strong, the replacement sail had to go up. We woke the rest of the sailing team on board Julie, Assaf and Sami and within a hour we were sailing again.

I write this for you all, so that you know some of the different sides of being a sailor, its not always easy or a champagne cursing that we do down here, but also for myself, because I have found that every time that I have a tough, difficult or traumatic experience writing it down is some what therapeutic.

Now we are 100 nautical miles exactly from our eastern way point to enter the Beagle Channel, 26 crossings of the Drake meant that this was my 13 expedition to Antarctica............... God I am lucky.

Crabeater Seals can fly

Sun shine and a crystal clear mornings haven't been happening that much here in Antarctica this February !

But when they have it is certainly been something to savor for everyone on board Xplore.

The islands of Hovgaard and Pleneau were our anchorage and birthday location for Troll, feeling that she was getting very old we decided to have a grand party the evening before, and invited great chum and mate Henk and his guests to join in the celebrations.

The rising of the sun did bring rays of light which for a few of the team were a tad too bright considering the strength of the birthday punch and the copious amounts of other delightful liquor's that were consumed during the night, but the warmth of the sun reminded us why Antarctica is so amazing.

Sitting on deck with a few of the team, I was positioned at the stern of Xplore having a quiet "Lets get my head together" type of a start along with a needed cup of tea.

Others were on deck including Assaf one of our able bodied team members from Israel, cleaning the decks with buckets of crystal Antarctic water, I was noticing a Crabeater seal swimming towards Xplore, and the floating shore lines which we use to keep us in position.

I didn't notice this crabeater at the party the night before, but it was a busy night, because this chap didn't have his bright brain cells working too well either, because as he was swimming up to our floating lines he just plum forgot or didn't see them !

With a splash and a great flap he whacks straight into the line, makes a rubbish sort of a dive down to cool off his sore nose.

This really gave me a chuckle, silly bugger, and I went back off to my fairy head land admiring the views with a sweet little smile on my face, oh nature can be so amusing !

Within about 20 seconds of day dreaming we were all startled to hear a great Ge splash from the Starboard side of the boat, my first reaction was that bucketing washing Assaf had fallen in the drink !! but as I quickly had turned my head, it wasn't Assaf entering the water but the end of the Crabeater who had tried to jump up on board Xplore !

Now to get a few figures straight here, Crabeaters when fully grown are around 400 Kg, the height of Xplore from the water to the deck edge is about 1.6 meters, and the life lines and stanchions are about another 0.6 of a meter higher on top of that.

Well the silly bugger, must have known that we were a great place for a feed and a drink because if he had managed to flop over that last little height of the life lines we certainly would have been in for very rude awakening, because a 400 Kg Crabeater isn't the nicest of guests to try a shoo off the boat at any time of the day.

Well, he left his mark in all of our minds, and he also left his mark on Xplore, the 600 mm high stainless steel posts that hold up and support the life lines are strong bits of steel. The Crabeaters entrance meant that he bent one of these over at a 40 degree angle Oppps, that's something new on the work list to repair !

Antarctic Adventures continue as we head north east to Enterprise island

Stomachs rumble, stomachs grumble

How could you ever look a client in the face before leaving to cross the Drake and honestly tell them that they weren't going to be sea sick ? Its a bit like thinking that a bank wont charge you interest rates on a loan.

Crossing the Drake though does come easier to some than others, but its often interesting as a witnessing by standing that is a none sufferer, about who will, and who wont be sick, an that is virtually impossible to judge or place a bet on.

There's the quiet sufferers who crawl into a corner, or to the depths of their dark cabin, there's the noisy "I want to make as big a mess" types, and there's the sly types where it just sneaks up on them and catch you by total surprise.

And you cant forget about the macho types, that always are looking for some thing else to blame this malady on "oh it must have been the peanuts that I ate" it's never happened before.

But I love the strong willed, get it out of the system and get on with it types.

You can see how horrible that they feel, their guts are wrenching, their faces are covered with tears and traces of the last meal, and they throw their heads back, lift their red strained eyes to the sky (obviously asking why god has done this to them) but they always surprise me because they just jump in and ask to help on deck, take another glass of water or even straight into another meal..... impressive.

There are though many medications and techniques that can help people to avoid or to get over from sea sickness, but the trouble is that it takes a test or two to work out which type works for the individual, that's the frustrating part, because even though you are taking something to stop or cure this, it some time reacts and can make someone feel worse.....poor poor souls.

But being comfortable and confident with the fact that you are on a boat,staying warm and dry but not too hot or too cold makes a difference, the human mind is a powerful device that does have the ability to help control the internal balance system that triggers this in people.

Stephen