Day 6, 12 March

I did some Due Diligence work with the charts today. I needed to make absolutely sure that I would not sail into an island that I was unaware of. On Marine plotter I had set waypoints at the following locations in degrees to two decimal positions:

- Marion Island, S45.85, E37.86
- Crozet Islands, S46.27, E50.87
- St Paul Island, S38.72, E77.53
- Amsterdam Island, S37.83, E77.55

To be sure to be sure I inspected the paper chart of the Indian Ocean that I had purchased in the USA and confirmed that there were no other obstacles in the way. I would have a wide corridor along latitude 43S. I had planned to at least do a sail-by of St Paul Island, the one where it is possible to sail into the crater of an active volcano (active because the waters at the SW of the crater are warm), but I decided that sailing over 200 miles north of my track to see it just wasn't worth it. I reminded myself of a wild horse ride in the Northern Territory in 1968. I turned the horse for home and yelled to Peter "See you at the farm!" and heard him yell something back that I couldn't catch because the horse was at full gallop. Before I knew it the horse was out of my control in a full gallop for home and all I could do was to hang on for the ride. As we approached the corral gate I clasped my legs around the sides of the horse and held down on the saddle with all of my might. As in a cartoon the horse reached the gate at full gallop then turned and stopped with in an instant. My left leg swung high up in the air but I was just able to keep from being thrown onto the iron rails. Peter arrived later with a look of concern. He had yelled a warning to me about letting the horse run free and half expected to see me draped over the rail with broken ribs. Like that horse I was homeward bound and somehow St Paul Island was not so important any more. I had already seen plenty of interesting things around the world, including anchoring several times in the crater of an extinct volcano at Isla Partida in the Sea of Cortez.

At midnight I was up to deal with a thrashing boom. The wind had dropped to 6 or 7 knots and it was time to drop the mainsail. I took advantage of the calm conditions to partially drop the sail and swap the reefing lines at the leech of the sail. Then before strapping the mainsail to the boom I loosened the mainsheet and boom vang then raised the boom with the topping lift to make sure that the mainsail material would be very clear of the spray dodger. That done I secured the back of the boom with ropes to the cockpit frame. Only then was I prepared to work my way along the boom strapping the sail. There was no moon and only star light but between the deck light and my head torch I had no trouble seeing.

By the time that work was done Jeff had lost control of the steering and the fully rolled out jib was thrashing. The question was whether there was enough wind for sailing. I took over the wheel and put the boat into the wind, hardened the jib a bit, and soon we were making over 3 knots directly to the east under autopilot control. The mainsail does not make much difference in light airs. We were at 40S52 and for now that was as far south as we were going to get. Twenty minutes later the wind dropped to below 5 knots and I was forced to roll in the headsail and lay ahull. When the boat settled down we were drifting about 0.5 kt to the east.

I was up at 6 AM for the SAMMNet session to find that the wind was now from the south and very weak at 3 kts. We had drifted 5 miles to the NE. My reception this morning was very bad so Peter at 6M6XHL on another boat acted as a relay. Sam confirmed that I was between two high pressure zones an the if I could get to 43S I would find good west winds at 20 kts. I could not expect any useful winds at my present location until 6 PM. I considered starting the engine in order to move perhaps 40 miles to the south before the expected moderate southerly wind but decided against it. My internal tanks were full and I had another 50 liters in reserve. I wanted to sail to Australia with full tanks to minimize water and algae problems and needed the reserve fuel for running the engine for electric power. I also wanted to be in a position to be able to motor the last 100 to 150 miles to Fremantle if circumstances called for it. I have no doubt that most sailors would disagree with my decision, but so be it.

This experience suggests to me that high summer is not the best time for setting off from South Africa for Australia because the low pressure systems recede to the south which means that boats like mine have a longer distance to sail in order to find westerly winds.

I spent a couple of hours doing some useful things. I whipped a loop of cord at the end of the 1st reefing line so that I can attach it to that loop of cord on the mainsail that will take the line through the 3rd reef cringle. I replaced the too-short downhaul line for the 3rd reef with a much longer one which I will cut to size when the mainsail is at full height. At the bow I tied the rope across the lid to the chain locker as a precaution in case the boat rolled over. I noticed that the shock cord lashing the front end of the whisker pole to the toe rail had come loose so I fixed that with an extra tight knot.

I made contact with Graham on ZS2ABK and had a good session with him. Graham is on the 20 meter band at 14.316 MHz USB and provides the long distance support of SAMMNet. I am now far enough away to pick up his signal, which should improve as I get farther away - to a point. Graham said that he would be able to support me almost all of the way to Australia, but told me to expect to lose him at longitude 95E and regain him at 105E.

My immediate wind situation is about as bad as it can get. I am smack in the middle between and advancing High in the Atlantic and a receding High in the Indian Ocean. The trough between them passed over me about 2 hours ago. The Atlantic High is at roughly my latitude and will cause me problems for days, though there may be periods of usable S and SE winds.

Graham passed on regards from Jeanne Socrates aboard Nereida who was at 44S, 78E. I told him that I had planned to start a Sailmail dialogue with Jeanne before the Pactor modem problem stopped my Sailmail capability. Graham then turned his beam to the Indian Ocean and I could hear Jeanne speaking, but understood about 1 word in 10. Graham pass my regards to her and I hope that as I move to the east I'll be able to communicate with Jeanne directly perhaps on another frequency.

I told Graham my theory about winter being a better departure time for Australia and he replied that he's been doing SAMMNet for over 10 years and he has noticed a marked change in weather pattern. He told me that the Highs are extending much farther south than they used and the optimal sailing routes accordingly have moved farther south. My copy of Ocean Passages suggests a passage to Australia at latitudes 39 or 40S. That is unthinkable now, and I've been advised to drop down to 43S and I will prepared to drop down further in search of wind. Graham also told me that Jeanne has been plagued with weak winds, so I'm not too optimistic about a fast passage once I reach the westerlies.

The wind sprang up abruptly at 3 PM, from the south at about 15 knots. I didn't waste much time in raising sail but the procedure took longer than I had expected because I saw that on the starboard tack we were on I would be on my knees raising the mainsail on the leeward side of the boat, a dangerous operation because I would be heaving the halyard while leaning backward with the rail below me. The safe thing to do was to tack the boat so that I would be leaning into the mast while I heaved on the halyard and adjusted the topping lift. I was tempted to avoid the time and work of tacking the boat but I must confess that I thought of the people who care and worry about me and realized that I owed it to them as much as myself to spare no effort in minimizing risk to my safety. So I tacked the boat, raised the mainsail, then tacked it back. But when things settled down the boat felt over canvassed with her single reefed mainsail against a wind approaching 20 kts. The other thing that disturbed me was that we were making only 4.5 kts no matter how I trimmed the sails. Fortunately I again did the prudent thing and dropped a slab of mainsail to the second reef. We went into the night doing over 6.5 knots sailing slightly off the wind and headed east. This was the vanguard of the approaching High and the wind was predicted to steadily back to the S/SE, SE, then E in the morning. At that time I would tack and point the boat south. I was glad too that I had not run the engine. What was the point in bashing the engine and using fuel to make 5 kts when ultimately it is the vagaries of the wind with its immense power that will define the duration of the passage.

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