After a wonderful stay on St Helena Island we set sail for Brazil.We soon settled in for the longest leg of our crossing with a steady 20kn easterly pushing us along which it continued to do for over a week.Typical trade wind sailing , beautiful but our weather forecast warned of a huge windless hole covering hundreds of miles ahead of us . Eventually the wind started to weaken so up went the gennaker until even keeping the gennaker powered up became a problem.
Drifting without wind was not an option so we fired up our Perkins and started to motor on this glassy sea. For days there was no sign of life , no birds, nothing and eventually when we did get a slight breeze it was on the nose . Up went the genoa and main and we put in some long tacks to try and make headway and save diesel . It reminded me of my dinghy sailing days spending hours watching the telltales and squeezing every bit of boat speed out of what wind we had.
For the first time we were now sailing at the ideal fishing speed , so out went the rapala and we were really hoping to catch a nice Dorado or small tuna. The next thing a couple of birds appeared spotting our lure and the hungriest of them dived on our lure and got himself hooked up.We stopped the boat and slowly reeled in a very grumpy bird. While l held him, Rob carefully removed the lure and we set him free. Thankfully after giving us a filthy look , he took off and disappeared with his mates.
We were running low on diesel so we decided to alter course for Ilha da Trinidade a remote island which is manned by the Brazilian Navy and is a prohibited area to everyone including Brazilians.We arrived early morning and dropped our hook in the small anchorage . Armed with my Portuguese dictionary l called up the base and received no response . I made a few more attempts still without response . Urs was convinced they were going to arrest us and Rob's thinking was that they were getting the big gun powdered up and that they were going to blow us out of the water. The next thing the radio came to life and we had the navy trying to communicate with us in Portuguese.Fortunately the doctor was able to speak a bit of English and he very politely enquired if he could ask me some questions.After a lengthy session on the radio he said " one momento ". We then waited about 5 hours wondering what was happening . He then came back onto the radio and said they were sending a boat out to us. We watched in disbelief as a large group of guys dragged a large inflatable down the beach, through the shorebreak and started rowing it out to us . We later found out that they were having problems with their outboard.
After a long paddle , the nicest bunch of guys came alongside including the Commander with packs of bottled water and a bunch of bananas which they grow on the island . They were very excited to have visitors and took pics of themselves with Windward in the background and eventually the Commander couldn't resist it and he jumped onboard put his arms around Rob and l and instructed one of his guys to snap away with his camera.
While this was going on their radio came to life and the news was that Navy Headquarters had authorized them to supply us with diesel which pleased them as much as it did us.They left with our 6 jerries and arrived back later with 120 lts of fuel , another load of bottled water , another bunch of bananas and paw paws which really pleased Urs.
It turned out that the 5 hour delay was them waiting for permission from the Brazilian Navy Headquarters in Rio to supply us with our fuel.
What a great bunch of guys and we say obrigado for all the effort they put in to help us out. When we sailed out late that afternoon they radioed us saying in broken English " Bon Voyage and eat the bananas ".Fantastic experience.The next morning the Navy frigate passed us on route to the island.
Our last night out while closing in on the Brazilian coast proved interesting.What started out as a quiet,mellow evening eventually led to Mother Nature hurling everything at us.First of all we sailed past a huge fleet of trawlers hauling huge nets behind them . Then l noticed a large yellow shape appearing into the bottom of the radar screen. A massive rain squall was creeping up on us and when it finally caught up it unleashed its fury, gusting winds and driving rain until it eventually moved on ahead of us.Not trusting Hlameni (our autopilot) in those conditions l decided to take the helm until things calmed down .
By now what appeared to be the glow of a cities lights appeared on the horizon. It was a city , oil rigs , platforms and dozens of supply vessels moving back and forth between them.At one stage l counted 17 AIS targets on our chartplotter screen , quite a sight .
The next thing l noticed a second but much larger yellow shape appear into the bottom of our radar screen measuring at least 12 miles wide and slowly hauling us in.In the distance l could hear thunder and the lightning lit up the horizon. This squall was a lot more pissed off than the first and we had a second round of heavy gusting winds and driving rain accompanied by lightning. All of a sardine , the instruments went on the blink and it was interesting dealing with this lot with the tried and trusted binnacle compass although it was difficult to read in the driving rain.
At one point Urs popped her head out of the main hatch and passed me my foulies. My Port Owen Yacht Club windbreaker wasn't doing the job.
As the night rolled on a third but milder squall tried its luck but it turned out to be a long night including the following day on the helm as with the wind veering you cannot trust an autopilot and by now we had shredded the bungee cords on Gerfried (our windvane) so hand steering it was although it was a great opportunity to fine tune my helming skills.
To cap it all,we picked up a long line on our skeg which we put a knife to then watched the fishing boat in the distance wondering which of the two he should recover first.
By now after no sleep at all , we decided to make landfall at Cabo Frio and by late afternoon we motored through the tricky river entrance and tied up stern to at the Yacht Club pier ending a passage of 16 days at sea.
Allan & Ursula Ward: Port Owen, Cape West Coast, South Africa.
Shearwater 39:
- L.O.A. 43ft (13.22m)
- L.O.D. 39ft (12m)
- L.W.L. 34ft (10.3m)
- BEAM 13ft(3.9m)
- DRAFT 6ft(1.8m)
HOW IT ALL BEGAN .
I placed my order on Nebe Boats on the 19/10/1992 for what was initially planned to be a complete factory built yacht that l would sail home to Durban from Capetown once she was completed. Unfortunately due to the demise of Nebe Boats in the early days of her construction it did not turn out that way, so l decided to truck her home to Ramsgate on the KZN South Coast to finish building her in our garden at home.
For many years we could proudly boast that we had the most expensive piece of garden furniture in town, but at the time l had no idea of how massive this project would turn out to be. As anyone who has built a blue water cruiser will tell you, particularly if she is kitted out with all the systems and the equipment that a modern cruiser has onboard these days, it is a daunting task . Looking at the positive aspects of this project, l know the boat intimately in that l designed and installed the systems, so from a repair and maintenance perspective l have no issues carrying out the work that is necessary from time to time.
The big day arrived on the 29/8/2008 when we craned her out of the garden onto a rig to truck her through to Durban for launching . What followed was three months of preparations to ready her for the maiden voyage to our home port in Port Owen on the Cape West Coast.
We had a fast passage down the South African East Coast including a storm off the notorious Wild Coast and arrived in Port Owen in dense fog. Windward had passed her first test with flying colours and since then we have enjoyed some great sailing on the West Coast.
We had a fast passage down the South African East Coast including a storm off the notorious Wild Coast and arrived in Port Owen in dense fog. Windward had passed her first test with flying colours and since then we have enjoyed some great sailing on the West Coast.
The master plan has always been to go cruising, so our plans are to leave for Brazil via Luderitz and St Helena Island at the end of February 2014. So far everything is on track although the “To Do“ list still grows each day.
The purpose of this blog is to record our adventure for ourselves, family and friends. Although it will probably end up being a brief summary of events while we are cruising, we hope you will enjoy and share some of our experiences with us.
LIVING THE DREAM .
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