Friday 9/12/11 – Life and Death – 14:13.0N 58:25.2W

“Come here often?” were the first words exchanged with the crew of the 20 metre NZ yacht ‘Haereroa’ which drew alongside us during our evening pre-prandial tonight. We had seen them astern for a couple of hours, and they were doing a good knot and a half better than us (more of which later), so they closed the gap and hailed us as we sat snacking and imbibing.   

They are also ARC participants, and we exchanged pleasantries (and promises of a beer in Rodney Bay), before they swept past us and disappeared into the distance. It left us contemplating the bizarre nature of the passage – hardly anyone within sight for 3 weeks, and then a boat onto which our pistachio shells landed!

Night Watch Incidents

We had a more complicated and absorbing night watch than usual, despite the fact we were motoring (more later!). We heard a bit of VHF chatter around 0300, of which we could only hear one end of the conversation, including a waypoint to reach. It coincided with Ali spotting a bright white flash in the distance, and coming on watch, I saw another and then what appeared to be an orange flash. We thought it could have been distress flares some distance off, but there had been no distress call on the radio. We altered course towards the activity, and Martin emerged from his bunk wondering what was going on.

We put out an All Ships call to see if anyone else had noticed the lights, but nobody replied (though there were at least 2 other yachts within 5 miles). Eyes fixed to the horizon in the general direction of the lights, we motored about 10 miles without seeing anything untoward. There were some squall clouds around, and it may have been lightning, but we could not afford to risk the possibility that someone was in trouble….

Someone else was, as we found out later, though it was unconnected with our own alert. The VHF call we had picked up related to a yacht one of whose crew had died of a suspected heart attack earlier in the evening. The yacht we could hear was arranging to rendezvous with them to transfer diesel for a quick motor passage to St Lucia. Beyond the trauma and grief that the crew and the relatives at home would be suffering due to the bereavement, dealing with another 3 or 4 day passage to get to Rodney Bay does not bear thinking about.

Weather and Progress

Not much is all we can record here! The trough that is stalking us has stolen our wind. We knew we would have to motor last night, but the forecast was for a modest improvement today that would allow us to sail.  No such luck, as we have not seen more than 5 knots of wind from any direction (and we have seen them all!) since dawn. Worse, the prospects tomorrow are no better, and Sunday is iffy as well.

Today was therefore a day for desperate diesel deductions… do we have enough to motor all the way (probably, but do the math again!). How do we improve our chances? (Transfer it all into one tank). Is that enough? (No, we won’t do any more laundry, or anything else that takes energy from the battery bank and means charging). Can we conserve fuel? (Yes, motor more slowly – and therefore the NZ yacht passed us at a clip!)…. And then there is praying (for more wind, sooner and from the right direction).

It is really a pity, since we had managed to sail almost all the way with the exception of the trawl back to Las Palmas on Day 1, and then an overnight when we were in the wind shadow of Tenerife. It does make you feel for the old square riggers, for whom there was no option but to sit and roll in the heat….

250 miles left to run, but not celebrating yet, just counting them down….F