L'Eau Commotion Westabout

6:00pm Saturday 28th October 2017 ( UTC-2 ) I have been sailing directly downwind in the South East Trades for about a fortnight now and people ask how easy is it to steer in these 14 to 22 knot winds and can it steer itself. What I have found is that this is a very difficult point of sail with a wind vane. When the wind gets to 20 knots the sleek lines of L'Eau Commotion often have it surging down the quite small swell at 12 to 14 knots and the apparent wind at sea level drops right away to be almost imperceptible. That of course means that the wind vane has very little to sense which means the yacht often veers wildly from its set course. One solution is to reduce sail quite a lot so it does not surge and the loss in speed isn't that much - say from an average of 7 1/2 down to 6 knots. The other way with the wind pilot is to alter course to Port or Starboard by about 30 degrees when the apparent wind is much stronger, but again this is tricky as the yacht then tends to gallop off into the wind. Then there is the ele ctric auto pilot which handles things well but the wind generator barely turns in these conditions so battery useage can become problematic in overcast conditions - putting out the spare solar panel helps a lot. In my attempt to compare the progress of L'Eau Commotion to the progress at the same stage with Katherine Ann I might have become obtuse. The fact is we are about a week ahead at this stage which doesn't count for much with two crossings of the Doldrums to be carried out. Still trying to read the tea leaves as to which is the best course. Ah yes the fishing. Two flying fish presented themselves for morning inspection. One large, destined for the frying pan, the other just the right size for trolling. Rigged up with two hooks trace etc. and over the side. Boat surges. Bait gone. Plan B? No, I've tried that one along with most of the rest of the alphabet. 'Nuf said .