Eventful Day

Treasure Cay
No LL

What a day! We left the anchorage around 9AM, buying fuel and water before we went. Our destination was Hopetown, about 21 miles away, but dead upwind!!!

It was blowing really hard, 25 knots with gusts to 30. Waves weren't much problem here in the Sea of Abaco. However, we had trouble maintaining 3 knots made good. Our average was more like 2.7 knots made good.

We were sailing with the full jib and with a double reefed main. She was heeling a lot with her rail under water a good part of the time. I reefed the jib 50% to reduce the heel. However our speed made good dropped to less than 2 knots. That was no good, so we dropped the sails to try to motor.

As I furled the jib, it felt strange. I ignored that and finished furling, then tried to motor toward Hopetown. With the motor we could steer straight at the mark, but our speed was only 3 knots. (A wind of more than 31 knots on our nose is enough to stop us dead when under power). Worse, Tarwathie started pitching for and aft resonating wih the waves. With each pitch the propeller would come out of the water. That's unacceptable. I turned back.

On the way back with motor and jib we flew at 8.5 knots. That's really fast.

En route I inspected the jib furler. It looked completely broken in half! I have no idea what happened or why. Therefore, to enter the harbor we had to take down the jib rather than furl it. We lashed it down on deck. With Nancy onboard, we can't store sails in the V berth.

When we returned to the Treasure Cay anchorage we saw a startling sight. A sailboat named Breakaway was sitting there at anchor. She was dismasted. The mast hung in the water to her side. On the way out, I hadn't noticed her sitting there. I asked another sailor what happened. He said that Breakaway's forestay broke last night around 1AM causing the mast to crash down. (How ironic. The boat's name is Breakaway.) I have no idea how or why the forestay broke.

He said that the owner had already hired a crane on a barge to come and help to lift the mast on deck. Too bad he did that, we fellow cruisers would have loved to have helped him to do that. It would have been an engineering challenge.

Next, we anchored, and I got an email saying that Jim R is coming May 1 to crew with us. Horray! That will be fun.

Finally, this afternoon I reassembled the jib furler. Nothing I can see is broken. It just disassembled itself. How or why I have no idea. I'm not pleased. That furler is a $2500 item that is only 16 months old. Now we have to wait for a period of less strong wind to put the jib back up and to roll it up on the furler.

Phew. I need a nap.