Water, water, everywhere........

South to New Zealand..... haven't you read about the Queens Birthday disaster? The Indian Ocean ..... ooohh, that's a scary place. Strong winds and giant seas. The Mozambique Channel? Ships get overwhelmed by simply enormous seas and are never seen again. Cape Town. Just mental katabatibc winds screaming down of Table Mountain. Mull of Kintyre? Well, enough said.

Let's just go to the Caribbean.

Look at the Moorings and Sunsail brochures. All blue skies, azure blue seas that barely ripple in the wafting, warm breezes. Whole families cavorting in the warm waters.

Jings, crivvens, help ma boab. What a trip. It's been punishing, exhausting and extremely wet. Mostly on the outside as, with all the leaping up and down climbing up, through and over big 'orrible breaking seas caused the fresh water sloshing about in our tanks to break off the uplift spigots inside the tanks. No fresh water from the taps for the last three days. It's a bit ripe on board.

The good news is that combining my limited electrical, mechanical, plumbing and bodge skills I was able to get it all going again. It was like Apollo 13, finding the problem then assembling bits of old crap to piece together a solution. If only they gave out O Levels for this ingenuity at school.

The end result is that tonight is shower night.

Two more stops and we're finally there.

Our Tracker (cut and paste).
https://forecast.predictwind.com/tracking/display/TimeBandit/

Here’s the latest video in which we go as slow as we can before going as fast as we can. As you’ve maybe read, we also come across a yacht reported overdue just before we left going even slower…….in some distress, sails in tatters, mid-ocean all in fairly boisterous conditions, not that you can really tell from the video, which goes to show just how much I’ve got to learn about photography.

Hope you like it nonetheless.

You’ve probably heard the high speed gibberish that radio and TV advertisers put at the end of their commercials to caution those able to understand it, that their once-in-a-lifetime offer or new wonder drug maybe isn’t exactly that great. This garbled, high speed message presumably absolves them of all responsibilities should something, readily foreseeable to them, but not to you, happen.

Well, I’ve this theory that the US Coast Guard send their radio operators on the course where these advertising folk learn to speak ultra fast. And unintelligibly. Over this last summer we’ve all but tuned out the US coastguard VHF announcements as, to us and many people we’ve spoken to, their messages are, as I say, unintelligible.

On the twelfth of November, the day before we left Norfolk bound for Bermuda, one of these messages came on air, “PAN, PAN - PAN, PAN” then the usual gobbledegook. We did catch the essence of the message, that there was a boat overdue en route Bermuda and it was white with a blue stripe. Other than that, nothing else understood. We should have paid more attention, indeed, as I’ve been threatening to do all summer, I should have called up and asked for a repeat of the message - but we didn’t.

The following day, we had our own challenges, specifically, how long should we plod along at three knots off the Virginia coast waiting on the strong north wind blowing against the opposing Gulf Stream to ease down to ten knots. These counter forces of nature create not just uncomfortable seas, but, from what I’ve read over the years, (try, “Overboard” for example) conditions that are, quite simply, dangerous. The other side of the coin was that we couldn’t wait too long as we had to get into Bermuda by midday Thursday to avoid a south easterly gale, forecast to be gusting fifty to sixty knots - a decidedly scary force ten to eleven in Beaufort speak. We continued our slow speed, frustrating, delaying tactics as long as we dared but even so, once into the Stream, got a heavy duty wash and rinse cycle, when the forecasted diminishing winds failed to, well, diminish. Faced with the fact we were in a hole, we kept digging and had a noisy, windy, but fast crossing. A hundred and thirty miles or so east of the US coast, we finally eased out the current and turned east south east for Bermuda, pedal to the metal, surfing all day at fifteen knots plus. (19.2kn top speed).

When it’s all a bit wild we tend to sail the boat from the “lounge”, patio doors firmly closed with some relaxing tunes on the stereo. We even ran the heating for a few hours. It doesn’t half beat monohull sailing when in the past we’d be sitting outside in the cockpit, boat rolling like a pig, taking waves and spray in the face. Catamaran sailing is just so much more comfortable. Fortunately, wind and waves have their own soundtrack so, even while tucked up indoors, you know exactly what it’s like outside. Assuming you’re awake.

Around ten o’clock the next morning I stepped into the patio to look at shaking out one of the reefs. As I turned to go back inside, I did my usual 360 degree scan around the horizon. To my surprise, I saw another yacht in the distance going our way. “Company at last” I thought, wishing again that more USA boats would make the minor investment in AIS. Closer inspection through the binoculars however showed the yacht was clearly in trouble, sails blowing in tatters in the wind. “Oh oh” I thought. “This looks like it could be the overdue “PAN PAN” yacht”. Poor Anne was hauled out of bed and we gybed and headed south west on a course to intercept.

As we approached I was looking for signs of life through the binoculars but, ominously, nothing. As we got closer it wasn’t looking good as there was absolutely no sign of life. We fired up the engines, dropped the main and made an approach at a speed that would allow us to get close but still have the steerage to get out of the way as the boat(s) lurched and yawed in the three to four metre seas.

As we closed, Anne suddenly said, “There’s someone in the cockpit.” Closer yet, sure enough, the skipper was at the wheel, apparently steering, but worryingly, gave no response at all as we passed within a boat length, not even a wave. We made several passes but couldn’t communicate. Given the state of the boat and it’s skipper, our guess is he’d suffers a knockdown. The genoa was in tatters. His anchor had come adrift and was dragging from the bow. The main boom and mainsail had been torn off and was now being towed astern as an extremely effective drogue. One of the saloon windows was smashed as was a deck hatch. Things weren’t looking good.

With the anchor, boom, mainsail and its assorted cordage dragging in the water and the boat rolling wildly, it made it somewhat challenging to get close enough to communicate. We really did not need our props getting fouled or getting so close that we’d get whacked thus compounding the problem. Altogether, with pretty much zero response it seemed to us he was well past the point of being able to manage or even help with the situation.

Twenty miles away a tanker was showing on AIS and we called him to A) turn around and give assistance and B) get a message to the coastguard. At the time he was switching fuel tanks or something and couldn’t turn around but he did call the coastguard. The tanker gave us the coastguard phone number but when we called, we got put on hold. Lovely. Not even some musac. After five minutes of silence, feeling we might need our limited airtime later, we gave up and called up our Ocean Cruising Club buddies back in the Chesapeake. They got in touch with the coast guard giving us an essential communications link and kept us updated with what was happening on the rescue front.

For a while we talked about launching our dinghy and going across to try and take him off but the seas were so rough the chances of executing that without one of us ending up in the drink were slim. We also considered floating down our life raft and getting him to climb in but in the conditions, the chances of making a bad situation much worse seemed highly likely as all the signs, or absence of them from the skipper, suggested he wouldn’t have the strength to do what was needed. In addition, a day or so before we left I was doing my all round, offshore checks to make sure something embarrassing, like the mast falling down, didn’t happen when we were offshore, when I found traces of sea water in one of the sail drive legs - the bit that turns the propeller. I replaced the oil and we stopped using the engine. We normally only use one engine anyway so no big deal. Right up until the moment you need two for close quarter manoeuvres in big seas.

On more than one occasion in the four hours we were “on scene” we sat back, put on our thinking hats and tried to work out how to get the guy off his boat and onto ours. Unfortunately, all the options presented an unacceptable degree of risk, after all, at the time, even though there was a communication problem, everyone was still alive and safe onboard - not floundering about in the ocean in a valiant but failed rescue attempt. Come to think of it, maybe that’s why he seemed to ignore my yelled suggestions to launch his dinghy or liferaft and we’d pick him up. “What? Get off my still floating boat, climb over the side into a tiny rubber raft and drift off in these seas. You think I’m nuts?”

By this time the cavalry had arrived in the form of a four engined, fixed wing Hercules. The coast guard overhead asked if we could get a VHF to him. We therefore got things organised then made another few passes to windward trying to throw the radio in a dry bag on the end of a floating line. Not a chance. We then tried floating it downwind while I worked the engines to keep us a safe distance off, Anne hanging off the guardrails trying to encourage it along. Unfortunately this also failed as the casualty and the bag were drifting at the same rate. We tried again tying it to our largest fender hoping the wind would blow it down but that also failed miserably for much the same reason. Only later, with time to reflect, did we think the option with the most chance of success would have been to tie a small lead weight to one end of our fishing line, the radio bag to the other. If we’d thrown it hard into the casualty’s cockpit, we might have succeeded. We might also possibly have injured the recipient proving my mothers oft repeated claim that “you could put someone’s eye out with that”, but at least, after he’d hauled the VHF onboard, he could have called us to complain. And that would have been a good sign.

We also knew the coast guard cutter was on the way so, in the end, after a discussion with the coast guard about the incoming weather system, on their suggestion, we turned, left the scene and hot footed it to Bermuda to beat the incoming storm. We left the scene with an intense feeling of guilt, like I hope climbers on Everest feel after they’ve walked past a fellow climber lying in the snow, asking for help.

When we got to Bermuda we asked Bermuda radio if they knew if the rescue had been made. But they new nothing. We also wrote to the US coast guard asking if the guy was safe but again heard nothing. It was only last night that our consciences cleared when our daughter found a report online saying that the following day he’d been taken off by the cutter and safely reunited with his family.

According to the report he was reported overdue on the 6th although we can only remember Pan Pan’s on 11th and maybe 12th. We found him on the 14th. Whatever the dates, he did well to hang in for as long as he did. The conditions were pretty awful.

All in all, an exciting trip south. Now, the next bit. Only another thousand miles to go.

Where’s a P&O cruise when you need it?

Pretty much everyone of our “cohort” that we did the long miles, islands and cockpit parties with are, as I type this, probably sat in front of their fire, tele on, the smell of their roast lamb dinner still in the air and maybe a dog lying at their feet. Some are in their camper vans, trawlers or cruising sun-shiny tracks on their e-bikes. Either that or they’re tucked up in a bed that doesn’t move, or better still, perhaps a bar.

We on the other hand have been enjoying that madness that is hurtling along in the pitch black in, of course, thirty plus knots of wind, three to four metre breaking seas, hundreds of miles from land. With that bit behind us we’re now anchored in Bermuda, waiting on tonight’s forecast thirty to forty knots gusting fifty to sixty to kick off. That’s force ten to eleven in Beaufort speak. Oh joy. Really glad I cut off fifteen metres of chain a few months ago to save a few kilos.

The reason we’re here is firstly because the weather patterns to sail direct to Antigua from Norfolk we’re all very nasty looking deep shades of dark red and secondly that, “if we go now”, we can instead route via Bermuda. “That’ll be a nice way to break the trip”.

However, in truth, it’s largely because after visiting Toronto a few months ago, a rather stroppy US immigration officer took exception to our comings and goings …… but mostly coming and stayings, telling us we couldn’t just come and stay in her country, dodging in and out the USA at will. The fact we were entirely legally compliant in terms of days in the country and that her colleagues in Boston and Maine immigration had set the dates clearly stamped and signed in our passports was neither here nor there. Clearly, in her opinion, we were here when we should have been there.

Obviously, somebody got out of bed on the wrong side that morning and it wasn’t us. With a pen stroke she cancelled our permissions to stay until February and said we were to be out the country by fifteenth December at latest. And understand this buddy, “I can revoke your ten year visa” so don’t mess with me.

For a few minutes I toyed with the idea of writing a strongly worded letter but instead, we sought out her boss who, without actually saying it, but whose raised eyebrows were a giveaway, understood his officer had indeed got out of bed on the wrong side. He politely apologised for the confusion and then used up more valuable paper in our increasingly cluttered passports re-setting the stamps and dates. However, this whole exercise made us realise that our plan for the first part of next year to leave the boat on the hard in the Chesapeake for a few months and go gallivanting around Patagonia was subject to the whim of whichever immigration officer we came up against and which side of bed they got out of. Pick the wrong officer and we could be left banned from the USA and Time Bandit stuck there. It wasn’t a risk we wanted to take and, we really need a full six months next year as there’s grand winkies to take sailing.

And that’s why we’re here, Time Bandit tugging at the anchor, driving rain slashing against the windows, spare anchor rigged ready to go, foulies and wellies ready to don and insurance policy looked out. We’re not expecting much beauty sleep tonight.

We’ll head out for the thousand or so miles to Antigua in the next weather window when hopefully we’ll enjoy balmy, benign conditions and be gently and leisurely wafted south in the Trades.

Meanwhile, I’m off to bed to read my book. Not the best choice!

Fat chance.

“Oh, did you read what the Bandits are doing now, the lucky sods?”

“What's that then?”

“Not only are they off to the Caribbean, get this, they're taking a mini break in Bermuda en-route.”

Let me tell you folks. That's the YouTube version. The reality is quite different. Contrary to our intuition, experience, planning, reading, advice and dodging around the Chesapeake at two or three knots, killing time, time we now desperately need, we ended up crossing the three knot Gulf Stream in twenty knots of contrary wind over current. Said wind from the chilly, bone freezing north.

After seventy miles of a heavy duty wash we emerged, engaged launch control and turned south east for Bermuda sitting at ten or so knots surfing into the high teens in a fairly steady force six to seven, the former being known as a “yachtsman's gale”, the latter as a pain in the ass.

It was, and remains a race against the clock. A south easterly gale is going to hit Bermuda from about 18:00 on Thursday night, in about thirty six hours.

Consequently, we've kept the pedal to the metal, abandoned all hope of sleep and are charging headlong into the pitch black, safely tucked up in our lounge, patio doors firmly shut against the unpleasantness outside.

Our tight schedule was further stressed by an incident I’ll report later, but folks, as noted, this cruising lark isn't all beer, skittles and Bermuda.

Not that we're ones to complain.

Here's our route, from now on known as The Force Seven route.


Stuart & Anne

Our Tracker (cut and paste)
https://forecast.predictwind.com/tracking/display/TimeBandit/

Follow the blog: www.TimeBandit.Co.Uk
YouTube: SV Time Bandit

Can you believe it? The weather is all over the place and unless we want to do Thanksgiving, if not Christmas here in Norfolk, it looks like we’re simply going to have to suck it up and go to Bermuda. Life’s a bitch.

If you have any interest, you can follow us on this link….

https://forecast.predictwind.com/tracking/display/TimeBandit/

That seems to be what we do these days. Since we left Boston, we've been in a hurry to get somewhere. I don't think we've ever fully grasped the basic principles of cruising and retirement. If you can suffer the video, you'll see our route south from Boston and what we got up to trying to get to Norfolk to leave within a week of the Salty Dawg rally.



The Dawg fleet of eighty insured yachts left Norfolk on 1st November and right now, or very soon, their crews will be enjoying a rum punch under the Antiguan sun.

We on the other hand, remain uninsured against "named windstorms" which, after all, are really the only ones to worry about, until 15th November.

We had thought we'd sneak away early but Mother Nature isn't working with us.

The good news is it's given me time to finish the latest video. The bad news is the GRIB forecast shows the storm in the pic is heading our way, right across our path in yet another week.

At this rate, we'll be in Norfolk for Christmas.

If there’s nothing on the tele our track is at https://forecast.predictwind.com/tracking/display/TimeBandit/

The poor YouTubers I referred to in my last blog might not have many clothes but they do have lots of viewers. Unlike me. However, I does me best…….