Blog Day 88
Latitude 43 17.32S
Longitude 116 05.04E
Barometer 1019
Air Temp 11c
Local time 2330 UTC+8 Albany Time.
LIVE TRACKER
Hi all,
Last night after finishing the blog I was a little bit wired and so it took me a while to fall to sleep. I think I ended up getting to bed around 4am despite trying for earlier. This whole re-setting the body clock thing really is not working out so well at the moment... The winds were still holding around 20 knots but were expected to ease to almost nothing over the morning, so I set my alarms to wake up more than normal to try to catch the shift. I was also lucky as the winds were holding at 330 rather than the forecast North direction allowing me to make a better heading.
As the winds had been stronger I had been sailing not quite close hauled to take the pressure out of everything, but as my goal is not to get North as quickly as I can in a northerly wind, I had now trimmed on all the sails so I was now sailing as close to the wind as possible. My speed had dropped a touch to 6 knots, but I was able to hold a better heading, and right now that was needed more than the faster speeds. When I sleep, I can set the B & G auto pilot to steer a compass course or to a set wind angle. If I steer to a compass course and the wind changes then Climate Action Now will either speed up or slow down as she comes out of the perfect trim, but if I steer via a wind angle then we can maintain our speeds, as the winds shift the boats heading will shift with it. This has some perks in conditions when you are expecting a favourable shift, as the auto pilot will do the course change for you, but if I am asleep and waiting for a not so favourable shift then I need to watch things closely. I checked regularly through the night to make sure that we weren't suddenly sailing in the wrong direction. The winds were due to swing to the north from the NNW and I would need to tack on that change.
I found that I couldn't remain sleeping any longer and got up at 11.30 am. The winds had eased to 15 knots and were still dropping, so I went on deck to find us surrounded by a heavy fog and a light misty drizzle. Not quite rain but just a lot of moisture in the air from the fog that it felt like it at as sailed forward. I shook out the first reef in the mainsail and put up the full main, I was debating about changing over the jibs from the No 2 jib to the larger no 1 jib when I needed to go to the sail locker and change over the micro plastic samples. Once that was done, I returned to the decks to keep pondering the sail change when I noticed an area of clear sky off the bow. The heavy grey clouds and fog were breaking to leave a patch of perfectly blue sky and far in the distance I could see a few white clouds. Normally, an area of clear skies doesn't alarm me, but today, I knew that I was surrounded by calms. If I sailed into that area of clear sky then I was likely sailing out of the winds.
When I was racing around the world in the Clipper Race there was this one moment when we were surrounded by calms in the centre of this huge high-pressure system, and the skipper Richard Hewson had spotted a small belt of wind running through the middle. He was able to identify that by a thin line of cloud stretching over us and directed us to stay directly under that cloud line. It was only a mile or two wide, so we tacked our way very slowly in 6 knots of wind along that cloud line, and was able to sail out of the calms. The rest of the fleet racing remained trapped, I think we won that race by more than 1000nm because of that cloud, so I learned my lesson. When surrounded by calms to always chase the clouds.
The clear skies were fast approaching and while the winds had dropped to 10 knots, I abandoned the idea of changing sails in favour of tacking. I was just going to tack for 30 minutes to the starboard tack and then return to this favourable heading. As soon as I tacked, the winds shifted at the same time and changed from NW to a N direction, so this was now actually the new favoured tack. That wind shift I had been waiting for had arrived. I changed the jibs over to the light air no 1 Jib on the bow before finally going below to eat my hot bowl of porridge that I had made when I woke up, using the Easy Oven.
(Note From Mum - We now have the Easy Ovens available in Lisa’s online store).
After that I spent most of the afternoon going up and down on deck to check the trip and make sure that I didn't spot any other areas of light winds. I have been fortunate to have managed to maintain 8-10 knots of wind from the NNE for the rest of the day, allowing me to sail in a slightly northwards direction. I am expecting that the winds will go around further to the east over the coming days before increasing with this next storm system, but that is perfect as it will allow me to sail a more direct course.
I now have less than 500 nm to sail as the crow flies but with the winds being from the North a lot of that time I will end up sailing a much larger distance. Thankfully, the eta is still sometime between the 25-26th of May. I think I will end up working for every mile gained on this run home. Given that I didn't manage a whole lot of sleep these past few days I am going to sign off here, but before I go I would like to take a moment to thank the following wonderful degree sponsors.
Some of these are out of order as these kind people have jumped in last minute to support me, and chosen a location with meaning to them but that I have already sailed past.
So thank you to:
116 East - Sister Ship Training - Huge thank you to Jackie Parry for your amazing support. A few years ago, we raced Climate Action Now in the Melbourne to Hobart Yacht Race as the first two-handed sailing all-female team to race. Jackie is one of the most knowledgeable sailors I know having spent many years sailing around the world with her Husband Noel. She has written many a book telling of her adventures on the high seas. Jackie now teaches sailing and founded Sister Ship Training to run a variety of sailing courses both in person and online, so make sure to take a look at her website. Thank you so much Jackie.
064 West - Marji Puotinen and Kids Care about Climate Change and supplied the following message.
“This longitude is meaningful to me as it was there at Hydrugra Rocks along the Antarctica Peninsula (amongst penguins and seals) that I launched the giant banner of 1,246 kids drawings about penguins and coral reefs as part of my 2018 international drawing contest (video https://youtube/ZlhQF0Hpeck). To me it is a reminder that I can do hard things. Though nowhere near as hard as what Lisa can do...”
Thanks Marji, If you all remember I am carrying the winning drawing from the latest Kids Care about the Climate drawing contest and taking it for a loop around Antarctica before Marji will send it to the winning artist R. A. Ranumi, 15 years old, of Asian Grammar School in Sri Lanka. Thank you for helping with this degree it means a lot.
039 South - Derek (Tony) Nelson - ONETONPUMP - On course towards a better bilge pump with a plan for this pump to improve the chances of a sinking sailor. Thank you so much Tony for your amazing support. Tony was a volunteer in Sydney when I was first refitting Climate Action Now for the first Antarctica circumnavigation and was a brilliant help showing up day after day to support me and donate his time, so thank you for your support this project too and for following my adventures all these years. I really appreciate it and look forward to connecting again in Sydney when I get back.
I am counting down the days and starting to get so excited for land life again. See you all soon and goodnight.
SPONSORS
TECHNICAL PARTNERS
DEGREE SPONSORS CLICK HERE
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#lisablair #lisablairsailstheworld #southernocean #southernoceansailing #solosailing #sailingantarctica #sailingsolo #sailingsothernocean
