06/06/2014
38’31 98N 28’37 46W
After a couple of days, the rolling in the anchorage got to us and we set sail for Horta which was a very roly passage with 25-30 knots from directly behind. We reefed the main and poled out the Genoa then a couple of hours later decided on just half the jib. We watched Chaos streak past goose winged under full main, Karen looked at me and I understood instantly that if I put just a scrap more sail up I would be in serious trouble and banished to the dog house so long it would be worth decorating. As it was we were in Horta before Chaos as they had a 6 foot tear in their mainsail and had lost hardware in a gybe. I hate it when Karen is proved right, it is just not fair

02/06/2014
38’ 18 20N 36’28 39W
There is a very large high pressure area sat west of the Azores and to enter this would mean no wind so we skirt round this heading north to keep with the wind. A French ketch is visible and calls us by VHF, we chat and I give them the weather we both decide to keep north and head for Flores which is the North Western most island in the Azores. We sail with our cruising chute up for about 3 days I downloaded another grib and there was some nasty wind due to pass over Flores in the next few days. I tried to contact the ketch but could not as they must have been out of range however, yacht Chaos heard our transmission and called us up. They were five miles away having come from Bermuda talk about a coincidence!
It was decided to burn down to our emergency reserve of fuel and we motored north for 6 hours hoping to find the wind. We caught the wind and made good time to Flores just before the front hit the last 20 or so miles fast in 25 knots of wind. Dolphins welcomed us as we passed the south of Flores and turned to the anchorage. The anchor was in and we slept with the wind howling, safe and warm in our bunks. We did the 2363 miles on the log in 18 days 2 hours and 35 minutes, not bad for a boat over 40 years old with a waterline of 26 feet.

22/05/2014
26 17 05’N 57 53 75’W
Today was a good day I awoke to 14 knots right on the beam and we were sailing well, I put out the fishing lines hoping for a tuna to supplement our food stores. A couple of hours later the reel started singing and I leapt to the rod, but there seemed to be nothing there. I told Karen who had raced out of her bunk in anticipation to go back and get some sleep. Reeling in the line suddenly went solid and then the reel started screaming as the fish on the end decided it wanted to go the other way. Looking back in the wake the fish jumped and tail walked across the water, the splash on re-entry was impressive. I was convinced that this was my Hemmingway moment and it was a marlin on the end. I shouted to the crew to get out of bed, stop the boat, help me and mix the Mojitos. The fight was epic and as soon as I had the fish close it either tried to go under the boat or took off on another run, the line that I had spent the last 10 minutes retrieving gone in an instant. Run after run the fish made and I must admit I was getting tired when eventually we could see the colour of the fish in the water. One last run and I could tell the fish was tired and I eased it along side. Now marlin is a seriously tasty fish but was so much more than we could eat, the decision whether to boat the fish or not had not been made prior to it arriving alongside. A marlin is one magnificent fish and I decided if I could get the hook out cleanly then I would let this beauty go. I leaned over the side and held the bill of the fish in one hand and removed the hook with the other getting a sound beating in the process. Once we had a measurement and the fish had recovered I let it go. I do not know how much it weighed but measured 2.5 meters from tip to tail. The pictures are slightly out of focus as Karen is unfamiliar with my Nikon SLR and I was unable to give coherent instructions during the battle!
The fishing gods were smiling on me as a couple of days later I was rewarded with a yellow fin tuna of a manageable size. The take was just before dark and was typical of a tuna as they tend to dive rather than dance around on the surface. We had three good meals off this catch, I even tried some of it raw and it was very tasty, you cannot get fresher!
We have been making our way to 35’.00.00N 40’.00.00W and we have been making good time one of our best days logging over 160miles in 24 hours when the wind starts to die. We turn the motor on and wish we had more fuel. We are getting the weather via our sat phone and Mailasail which seems very reliable.
I awoke this morning to the good news that not only had Karen caught a tuna but had boated it, despatched it semi humanely, gutted it and placed it in the fridge. I was impressed but this was short lived as she also said that it was my watch and to vacate the warm bunk pronto!

20/05/2014
23 15 00’N 60 00 00’W
After yesterday’s debacle with the Genoa I was a tad low when this happened and disheartened we brewed a cuppa and sod it, I used two teabags, it was that bad. As usual with a problem we broke it down into small parts.
1. The main had to come off the boom and needed to be stored neatly on deck, sounds simple but as soon as the main was inoperable the boat rolls badly.
2. Remove the Stack pack and bits of lazy jacks as I was not going up the mast to re-reeve them and they are not necessary to the operation of the boat.
3. Reeve the reefing lines back don the interior of the boom.
4. Replace mainsail with the first reef set and then sort out tying the tack to the end of the boom a la Heath Robinson.
5. Another brew!
Steps 1,2,4,5 were although time consuming and physically tiring, straight forward. Step 3 was one of the most frustrating couple of hours I have experienced. We tried stiff nylon line without success and we could not use anything solid because of the first 90⁰ bend. Eventually we settled on a round fishing weight with very light nylon and tried to roll this down the boom and around unseen internal obstacles. It was like two people trying to do one of those maze puzzles, you know, the ones with the ball bearing in that you attempt to complete after Christmas lunch but give up after 5 minutes due to lashings of after dinner port. Oh how we laughed, as we tried to get this lead ball down the boom and out of the reefing line exit. Just as the communication lines were melting, out fell the lead ball! We danced around like schoolchildren who had just found two blue sachets of salt in their salt and shake crisps. Once we had one line trough we used this to draw three heavier lines through and then pulled through the reefing lines.
After this we soon had everything ship shape and we were on our way once more.
The wind gods have departed and we are in a flat calm, the motor is turned on and we motor for 24 hours. We top the tank up and realise that even at low revs we are burning about 55 litres in 24 hours. Our strategy is then to turn the motor on when we are doing less than 3 knots this changes later to only turning the motor on when there is no discernable forward motion.
The self steering broke today, we have the auto pilot which is electric and the Windpilot which takes no electricity so this is the preferred helmsperson when batteries are low. The central connection shaft had sheared so I set about finding something to repair it with. After an exhaustive search the best solution was in the form of a carbon rod unfortunately this was one of my beloved fishing rods. I had to take a hacksaw to the rod and soon had a section which I could epoxy in place, repair done and we again have redundancy in our self steering so the sad loss is easier to bear!

17/05/2014
The journey begins! The first day sees some South Westerly winds of about 14 knots which is ideal as I can only really relax when we are clear of Anguilla. The next few days alternates between light winds and heavy squalls accompanied by real rain that gets you wet and 30 odd knots of wind.
As I was on the early watch I visually checked the boat over as the light allowed and noticed that the webbing on the tack of the Genoa was fast coming away and this is not good. The stitching had been rotted by the UV, quite frustrating really as I was aware of this and asked a sail maker in Marin Martinique to go over the sail and re stitch any suspect areas. This he did, putting some stitches in the UV strip and gave the sail a clean bill of health, I won’t be going there again!
Once the sail had been removed from the forestay we set about a repair, four hours, four sail needles and a couple of muttered expletives later we had something resembling a repair that would with a fair wind, last to the Azores.
The next day a squall hit us and I managed to furl the headsail and sheet in the main. There was a twang as the outhaul inside the boom, for the tack of the sail parted. This took the lazy Jacks, and all the reefing lines out of the boom and then proceeded to knit a tangled spaghetti of lines which once wrestled into submission on the cockpit floor resembled one of Karen’s early Knot tying practice sessions (keep crossing the lines until there is no end left).

10/05/2014
We are now looking for a weather window for the crossing to the Azores, so provision shopping is the order of the day as well as keeping topped with the fuel and water supplies. Every morning with rapt anticipation we download the Grib files studying them closely just to see if departure is imminent. The trouble is there is usually some very light weather to go through before you pick up a low going East and can ride a South Easterly, usually around North of about 32°. Each seven day grib seduces you into waiting as the next one is going to be perfect. We decide that we will have to motor through some windless areas to get north so buy two more fuel cans and fill up the two spare 5 litre dinghy cans. We discuss how much extra fuel to take, as we have done very little motoring in the year that we have been away. We simply do not know so we leave with full tanks and 90 litres in cans.
We download the gribs on the 16th of May and decide that we would make our move the next day. So a busy day ahead we do a final shop for fresh stuff, buy some second hand books from Shrimpeys, clean the boat hull and prop, check out, haul aboard the dinghy, clean the barnacles and miniature ecosystem off the dinghy bottom, deflate and stow dingy and winterise the outboards as they will lay in the locker for the journey. Come the evening we take a shower in the cockpit and are so exhausted that we eat one of our emergency, out at sea ready meals as cooking has temporarily lost its lustre. A large catamaran anchors upwind of us and then they all decant to the tender and let go, the tender will not start and they drift towards us. When they get to our anchor chain they enquire about borrowing some oars. I should have taken this show of seamanship as an omen as at 2am there was a large bang and they had hit us amidships. I got up like a shot out of the forward hatch, the crew were on deck but no attempt was made to place a fender between the two colliding vessels. They had dragged and hit us without even an apology; a well placed fender would have prevented the scratch in our topsides.
Looking at the situation we had no dinghy blown up and to get into a wrangle with insurance etc would surely delay our departure, we decided to let it be and leave the next morning. We were exiting the lagoon with the 10:30am bridge opening, so we pulled the anchor up and took our place in the queue to exit. I was holding position with the bow downwind when the same catamaran came within six feet of my stern and demanded I move forward, which I could not do without queue jumping (not British). I explained that according to the collision regulations he as the vessel behind was the give way vessel and he would have to avoid me. To this he replied that I knew absolutely nothing and started rabbiting agitatedly to his crew in a foreign tongue. I am convinced that he must have been charter as most owners even of very posh boats seem to be polite. I think all charter boats should fly a flag so that they can be recognised.