d'Albora's Action Project: AUS 360 Blog Update
Presented by Pivotel
Afternoon all,
Well after the dramas of the last few days I was very happy to have an uneventful evening. I even managed to get to bed before midnight. The winds last night remained light blowing in from the East at 10-15 knots. I was still aiming to get some more easterly ground covered before the winds backed to the NE and I would start sailing North so I was sailing mostly a wind angle of 60 degrees which was giving me a steady speed and I was able to sail over 100nm to the east before the winds shifted to the NE.
The winds built a little at 10 pm and I was expecting them to continue to build so I ended up putting the no 3 jib out and furling the no 1 jib away and sailing with that smaller jib and the mainsail. It was borderline all night where I likely could have had the No 1 jib out but the winds were just a touch too high in the gusts and given how close to home I am I don't really want to break anything else so I was erring on the side of caution to prevent blowing out the sail.
Somehow through the night as I monitored a few ships that were passing me by I felt like I got a good sleep in however when I woke up this morning I was still feeling tired and I had a splitting headache as well. I often get headaches when I am really tired and as I normally only get that tired when I am at sea it is common for me to have headaches when sailing however I don't think that I have suffered one yet on this trip. A couple of panadol and I was a good a new.
The winds by now had swung around to the NE so I was no longer making easterly ground but now sailing North and the winds were building to 20 knots so after breakfast I went on deck and put the first reef in the mainsail. I could have still held the full mainsail but I always have the habit of reefing early when I know that the winds are going to keep building. I find that this helps to keep me out of the worst of the conditions and makes the boat more manageable. I also noticed that I got an extra knot of speed out of Climate Action Now with the reef in as I was no longer pushing hard and the deck was slightly flatter making for a faster boat. So now I am sailing with the 1st reef in the mainsail, the J3 jib up and the storm jib up.
By getting the storm jib up yesterday I now no longer need to be crawling around on the fore-deck in rough weather putting myself at risk and now when the winds build enough that the J3 needs to be partially furled I will simply put it away and start sailing with the storm jib. I will also be putting a sail tie around my two headsails as a secondary safety to make sure that they won't come undone in the strong winds that are due. So now all I can do is sit and wait for the winds to arrive and as the barometer drops and the winds build I will put my reefs in the mainsail and change down gears until I can safely sail through this gale but I feel like we are ready to take it on.
Thanks to the following Sponsors for all their continued support: d’Albora Marinas, Pivotel B&G, Australian Geographic, Zhik , Park Fuels, Karver, 3M, White Bay 6 Marine Park, and Great Circle Life Raft
