Eight days at sea
After our visitors left, we had two long days motoring to get to Gibraltar (wind against us), mostly uneventful, apart from passing through a big thunderstorm, with lightning crashing all around the boat.
We weren’t sure what to expect in Gibraltar. What we found was torrential rain, cheap English breakfasts and coachloads of tourists in plastic macs desperately shopping for bargains. We refilled our fuel tanks at tax-free prices, studied as many weather forecasts as we could find on the internet and then prepared for our longest voyage to date – 750 miles to the Canaries.
We headed out into a dying low pressure system, so spent the first two days motoring into a SW F5. The wind swung westerly on the third day so we hoisted the sails and turned the engine off. That was more like it! Until late that evening there came a terrible grinding noise which turned out to be the main prop shaft free-spinning and hitting the rudder, having sheared off completely near the coupling. Dave managed to pull it back and wedged it with spanners to stop it slipping as a temporary measure.
So now we had no choice but to sail. Hmmm. Things still went well once we adjusted to the new mindset – best not to think about getting into harbour yet, just concentrate on getting there…Then the following night, the gaff jaws broke. We pulled down the main and topsail and sailed on the two front jibs until morning. Come daylight, Dave got out the grinder and welder, repaired the gaff jaws (not the easiest job on a rolling boat) and 45 minutes later we were sailing properly again.
Then the wind progressively died and we found ourselves becalmed. ‘It can’t last long’ we thought, and spent a relaxing day sunbathing on deck and swimming in the sea (it’s a really deep blue out here).
The following day brought a hint of wind and we ghosted along at just under 2 knots with all sails set. The planned 6 or 7 day trip started to look like it might take 10 days or more. Panic started to set in, not least because we had Ed & Maria flying out to meet us in 5 days time… Dave put his brain into gear and came up with something that ‘just might work’. He welded the broken halves of the prop shaft together, tried the engine for two minutes and nothing went bang. He then made up some metal ‘bridging straps’ and welded these across the join. We tentatively put the boat in gear and it worked. A little out of line maybe but nothing serious. ‘It may last 5 minutes, it may last 5 days’ was the prediction.
It lasted the first day, then all night, and another day and night. We expected at any moment to hear another horrible grinding sound but, no, it kept spinning the whole way to Tenerife. We spotted the high peak of Mount Teide hidden in the clouds on Tuesday afternoon and arrived safely at Los Cristianos on Wednesday lunchtime, just a day late to meet Ed, Maria, Alice & Grace (& the bump!).
Otherwise, we have survived the trip well. We had plenty of food and soon got used to the ‘motion of the ocean’ (although it’s hardly been rough). Once away from land, we slept at night with the radar on ‘watch’. We were both surprised by the lack of wildlife. In 8 days, we have seen two turtles, several gannets, a couple of storm petrels (one of which came and sat on our gaff during a windy moment) and a small unidentified bird that came and flitted round our wheelhouse some 200 miles from land. Also some dolphins (pantropical spotted variety) which played round the bows as we approached Tenerife. Otherwise, nothing but sea, sky, clouds and the odd ship.
Apart from a couple of hitches, the boat has been going really well. How else would we have discovered that we can sail in a mere breath of wind, albeit very slowly? Bound to get a few snags! And we’re still speaking, which says something.
