Day 4 - Lay Day at Frailes

I woke up at 7.30 PM feeling good after an evening of 3 eggs fried with ham and cheese followed by a horrible no brainer action movie "The Cave". The boat was still in 12 meters of water and all was well after a very quiet night.

My first galley task was to fill up the water jug. I was pleased to see that I had not totally used up the previous day's quota. I had a closer look and saw that there was .5 liters of water remaining in the jug and then I noticed that the capacity of the jug is 2.8 liters, not 3.8 liters that I had in my head. No wonder I was having so much trouble getting by on 3.8 liters a day - it was actually 2.8 liters a day. So yesterday I used 2.3 liters of fresh water during the entire day. That isn't bad considering that the days are rather hot and I need quite a bit of water just for drinking. (Is is sustainable? Yes, if you don't wash clothes and wash everything else - including your teeth - with sea water.)

On deck I set up the perimeter line. I found a superb length of half-inch rope, never been used and very supple. I wanted to use good rope because I'll be relying on this line to keep me balanced when walking to the mast, not to mention keeping me on board if the unexpected happens. I made a very tight and secure knot on the cockpit stainless steel frame on the starboard side, ran it to the inner shroud and after a couple of wraps around that passed the line across to the port side inner shroud. After a couple of wraps around that I ran the line back to the stainless steel cockpit frame on the port side and made it off with another tight and secure knot. There remained enough line for me to run the end of the line to the back of the frame, giving me a secure line above the stainless steel tubing that runs along the side of the cockpit. With a short piece of line I ran a line on the starboard side too.

I'll deal with the issue of a jack line running along the center of the foredeck to the bow after I am out at sea and have stowed the anchor.

Then I gave the engine a "major" check. I slid back the cover and had a careful look all around. All looked clean and in order. The belt tension was good. The engine and transmission levels were good. The coolant level was good too. I had looked at the vacuum gauge in front of the Racor fuel filter two days earlier while the engine was running at 2000 rpm and the needle was still firmly in the "0" zone, with no hit of climbing to the amber "danger" zone.

Then it was time to top up the internal fuel tanks. The engine hours were at 92.7 which meant that I had run the engine 13.6 hours since the tanks were last filled. I brought out the legendary Baja fuel filter on deck from its secure storage between the V berths. I treat this device with as much respect as my computers and navigation equipment. It is a superbly engineered piece of equipment that with its three filters is alleged to filter out water. When I purchased it at Whale Point in Richmond I was told that Baja filters were no longer being made and I got one of the last available ones.

The filter fits nicely in the boat's fuel intakes on the cockpit coaming, but as a precaution I secured the it to the boat with a lanyard. The first jerry container I chose was the one on the starboard side with a missing vent cap. I need not have worried because the electrical tape that I had used to seal the vent was as tight and secure as any cap. I emptied out the 20 liters in that container then fetched another one from the port side. Soon I got a pleasant surprise: the tanks were full after pouring in only 1/3 of the second jerry container.

My best estimate is that 27 liters of diesel were consumed in the 13.6 hours of running. That's only 2 liters an hour, which is amazing considering that the bulk of the time I was running the engine at between 2000 and 2400 rpm. This seems too good to be true, but I've double checked the numbers and cannot find a mistake. ... It's possible that the internal tanks were more full when I filled them at the marina, but today I was taken by surprise and overfilled, sadly losing a half liter over the side. For now I'll assume a conservative fuel consumption of 2.5 liters per hour in my calculations. I'm thinking that just maybe the fuel consumption will be down to 1 or 1.25 liters per hour when I'm chugging along at 1000 rpm charging the batteries, driving the boat, and warming the cabin (Yes!).

After a light lunch of fruit I had a go at the salt water pump at the galley. I managed to free the plunger but something must have broken inside because the plunger action is erratic and it has no seal. I could have put in an hour removing the pump from the counter top and unscrewing the cylinder base to have a look inside, and I may do that in the future. However, by then I had figured out a work around that is better than getting the pump going again. The thru hull ball cock supplying salt water to the pump works very well. I removed the hose from the fitting, cracked the valve open, and sea water began to spurt in. I then shut the valve and not a drop came through. I've reconnected the hose to the thru hull fitting but removed the other end from the pump. Whenever I need sea water I'll put the free end of the hose into a bucket and open the ball cock valve. I've tried it and it works fine. I took the opportunity to establish the waterline of the boat inside the cabin. It runs midway across the oven and about a foot above the cushions of the cabin settees. So whether I am standing, sitting, or lieing down, when I am in the main cabin I am contributing to the stability of the boat.

That type of pump has been a disaster for me. The first one lost its ability to prime after a few months and broke down totally after about a year. This replacement pump was installed less than 2 years ago and soon lost its ability to self prime. Both Brenda and Arnold have many seen me sucking on the spout of the pump trying to bring up the sea water so that the pump would start working. Who needs that? I'd rather open the door underneath the sink, pull out the hose, open the valve, and get a quick half a bucket of sea water instead of getting a mouth full of sea water then pumping up and down for several minutes like a madman. ... What I'm really happy about is that I won't have to face the prospect of dipping buckets into the frigid waters of the Southern Ocean. Besides, I don't think that my four plastic buckets could have stood up to that stress for 3 months.

After a break I removed the asymmetrical spinnaker out of the sail locker. The sail lockers on this boat are great for storage but terrible for day to day work. The problem is that the sail lockers are buried under the overburden of everything else stored in the V berth area. The result is that to get to a sail I must devote hard 20 minutes to removing items from the V berth area into the main cabin, then remove the mattress on top of the locker, then lift the locker lid and first remove any sails on top of the one that is required. In this case the spinnaker was at the bottom of the locker.

Last night I began to think of the possibility of using the spinnaker to help me get past Cabo without running the engine for 10 hours. The wind conditions will probably be right and if I can manage it I'll have a fast end enjoyable ride, so it would be worth the effort. If I do decide to fly it I'll have to work calmly and alertly, keeping the thought in my mind that if I am bold enough to plan on rounding the Horn on my own I should be bold enough to come to grips with the spinnaker. Anyway, to that end I now have the spinnaker on top of the sail locker ready to be pulled onto the foredeck. In its place I stowed several boat fenders and a mooring rope in the locker.

That completed the bulk of my rest day. Unless the grib wind report gives me a surprise tonight I'll probably depart for Cabo and the Pacific Ocean shortly after dawn tomorrow. It will be a long day.

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