Kim stayed at Puerto Calero marina in Lanzarote while we returned to England. On the whole, we thought that our 2024 cruise had been reasonably successful, although the rather rough trip between Rabat and Lanzarote had confirmed Sally’s view that she did not like long passages, and that the crew for the trip across the Atlantic would consist of me, my brother Martin, and Ed Sadler, my daughter’s partner.
Sally and I returned to Lanzarote on 31st October to prepare for the Atlantic, with five suitcases packed with parts for the boat, and a fairly lengthy job list. Puerto Calero marina has a boatyard, but there are no chandlers or significant shops within walking distance. We visited the chandlers in Arrecife to order a new mainsail batten to replace the one which we discovered had been broken when the sail snarled in the rigging on the way to Lanzarote, and shopped for food.
Neither of us were feeling very well, but we steadily worked our way through the tasks, installing extra water storage, securing the dinghy davits…
Preparations were interrupted by a bout of Covid, but we had more or less recovered when the crew joined us, assisting us with last minute jobs, including swimming in the marina to give the boat’s hull a last minute scrub. Sally, though still recovering from Covid, masterminded the provisioning, which required several trips to supermarkets and returns in very full Fiat 500 rental cars.
On 26th November we left our marina spot and, after filling up with diesel at the fuel berth, at 1400 departed Puerto Calero for Prickly Bay, Grenada.
We coasted past Lanzarote and then Fuerteventura, using the engine as the wind was very light, and we wanted to avoid an area of contrary light winds near the Canaries.
The Trade Winds are bands of easterly winds north and south of the equator. Air moving south towards low pressure near the equator are turned to the east by the Coriolis acceleration caused by the Earth’s rotation. The North East Trade Wind, which we intended to make use of blows reliably south of about 19 degrees North. Rather than steer directly to the Grenada on the shortest “Great Circle” course, we headed south from Lanzarote in search of the North East Trade.
The traditional route to the West Indies is to “go south until the butter melts, and turn right”, and to pay homage to this tradition we called the waypoint at 19 degrees North, 30 degrees West “Butter”. The area between the Canaries and the Trade Wind is known as the “Horse Latitudes”, and is famous for frustrating winds and calms. It fully lived up to its reputation, and on several occasions we had to burn some of our limited stock of diesel to proceed slowly under engine, as the rolling of the boat when becalmed was unbearable.
In the Mediterranean we had always used our excellent Raymarine autopilot system, though Kim is fitted with an Aries wind steering system. This has been roundly cursed since we have owned the boat, as it is rather vulnerable when mooring stern to, and gets in the way when we raise the dinghy on the davits. We knew that Aries systems work well on tiller steered yachts, but we were sceptical of its ability to overcome the friction of Kim’s steering system, with its wheel, complex linkages and triple rudders. However, to my delight, as soon as we attached the Aries lines, the boat steered perfectly, keeping Kim at a constant angle to the wind. This was a great benefit, as it saved electricity, and mechanical wear on the electronic autopilot drive.
On 3rd December, though my initial seasickness had abated, I was still feeling quite ill with the aftermath of Covid. The boat was running well before a north easterly Force 5 when it gybed, tearing the mainsail, which, we now realised, had been weakened during the trip from Rabat to Lanzarote. There was no alternative, and so we removed the sail from the mast and boom, and passed the bulk of it down through the hatch into the cabin. For the next two days, Martin sat in the cabin, doggedly ignoring his seasickness, sewing and gluing the tear, and reinforcing the sail with a patch cut from an Enterprise dinghy mainsail. There was great relief when the sail was hoisted and held together, and we were able to sail properly again.
On 4th December we felt and heard banging from the keel resonating through the boat’s structure, and on investigation we found that it was no longer resting on its support pins as it was partly raised, supported only at a single point by the hydraulic ram, and was able to move around in its case. I don’t know how this had happened, but the isolating breaker was closed, and the most plausible explanation was that “RAISE” button on the remote control stored in the chart table drawer had been somehow pressed as the contents of the drawer moved with the boat’s motion. We pressed the keel back down onto its pins with the ram, and peace returned.
We fell easily into a routine of two hour night watches, and ten days after leaving Lanzarote, we reached 19 degrees N, and altered course to the west, as we hoped we were within the northern boundary of the Trade Wind. The Trade Wind passage is often described as idyllic, “champagne sailing”, but I have to say that in the light of experience I am not a great fan of it for several reasons:
Sailing almost directly downwind is not the strong point of Bermuda rigged sailing boats, and there is the constant possibility of an uncontrolled gybe. In the Trade Wind, though Kim’s boom was kept under rigid control by a Wichard “Gybe Easy” device, and a downhaul attached to the toerail, an unintentional gybe is unpleasant, and even though we had fitted a protective bar above the doghouse to ensure that the boom was kept well above the heads of people standing in the cockpit, a gybe puts considerable stress on the boat’s gear.
The motion of the boat is wearying, even though Kim, with her flat bottom and the high righting moment of the ballast bulb at the end of the deep keel did not develop the rhythmic “death roll” experienced by some boats when the frequency of the waves coincides with the resonant frequency of the boat’s rolling motion.
In Europe and the North Atlantic, during the sailing season, we are used to short nights, but the winter nights on the Trade Wind route are very long. True, when the sky is clear, the view of the stars is brilliant, but it often overcast, and I found the night watches, which were two hours long, to be very dreary. I have spoken to other people who have made the Trade Wind crossing, and this seems to be a common feeling.
Squalls! These seem to be made light of in the various Atlantic crossing guides, one publication even referring to them as “exhilarating”. I think perhaps in our case, the squalls were exacerbated by an unusual low pressure system intruding into the Trade Wind latitudes behind us, but some of the squalls we experienced were quite severe. The same publication speaks blithely of tracking squalls on radar or with a hand bearing compass, and altering course to avoid them, but some of the squalls we encountered filled the whole of the radar screen on its 24 mile setting! We don’t have an anemometer, but the wind in some of the largest squalls was very strong, with breaking wave crests and the sea surface white with blown spume. The wind direction is unpredictable, and there is considerable danger of the boat being taken aback, especially if it is running with a poled out jib. In one squall, the mainsail was damaged for a second time, requiring a second session in the cabin with needle, thread and glue gun. In St Lucia we saw a boat in the marina which had gybed in a squall and had broken a spreader. In one particular series of squalls we were close to a catamaran, and the wind was so strong that we were concerned for its safety – fortunately our fears were unfounded.
On Christmas Eve 2024, Kadash arrived in Prickly Bay, Grenada, a beautiful location. We had successfully crossed the Atlantic, and look forward to cruising the Caribbean over the next few months.
Footnote
At the risk of repeating what is said in other sources, the list below sets out a few tips which might possibly be of use to potential Trade Wind sailors:
Take plenty of spares and tools, including a spare sail if possible. We had to repair the mainsail (glue gun very useful as well as cloth and needle and thread), a corroded engine core plug (aluminium sheet and epoxy). We started with about six spare blocks, and ended with none as they were used to replace broken ones and to improvise downhauls etc
Be prepared for long dark nights
Keep a good lookout for squalls. Radar, if you have it, is very useful at night, but it is rather power hungry. I suggest that if you see a nasty looking squall coming, you should probably stow the mainsail, and remove the pole if you are running with the jib boomed out. Running before the squall is an option, but may require hand steering, and we successfully hove to under just a triple reefed main for several hours to ride out another one
It is very important that the mainsail boom is kept under control. A gybe with a preventer rigged is unpleasant, but will not result in damage or injury, unlike a gybe with an unconstrained boom
There is hardly any traffic. We saw a few yachts, and a merchant ship perhaps every five days or so. The risk of collision is very low
Plenty of food and water. Potatoes and tomatoes stored in nets lasted well, as did potatoes stored in a dark dry locker in the fo’c’stle. We used salt water for showers and clothes washing. Our fresh water consumption was about three litres per person per day, though we carried well in excess of that. If you use bladder tanks, such as those made by Plastimo, make sure they are flushed out thoroughly before filling. The water in ours was completely undrinkable. I fitted a rain catchment system, which works well and is worth considering
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