It's so nice to be in an ocean with long low swell after the nasty seas of the mediterranean! Lovely weather doesn't hurt either. Two days out from Gibraltar, we've had good sailing, but wind has dropped away and motor's back on. A couple of whales, perhaps Minke, came over to have a look as they swam north. A little migrating bird, like a thornbill size (Philip says it's a Chiffchaff!, and the one that came inside the boat is a Barn Swallow) flew straight to my knee for a rest. The rigging is festooned with spider parachutes. They are coming from Africa flying over the waves but I don't expect they will make it!
Caught the first Atlantic fish, a tiny stripey tuna, delicious grilled with ginger etc. (recognise my shirt Bo?)
Gibraltar to Canaries, day 4
At least I think it's day four… It's turning into a longer hop than hoped. Instead of a 5-10kn tailwind we have 2 -3kn headwind, so motoring at 4kn. Yesterday was not a happy day. The big autopilot failed, and after spending half the day head down finding and replacing blown fuses and running tests, I think it's the servo motor on the hydraulic pump, so another expense… Noticed the wall of one of the water tanks is leaking into the cupboard where Navman lives. I've not been able to use sailmail since day two, so I've seen a few emails from Anne, but can't download them. Did manage to send a short one to her. I'm sure the SSB radio should be connecting at this distance, so having attached some loose connections, replaced some cables and installed a pile of clip-on ferrites I still don't have the ocean communication I planned. AIS stopped working again, should have bought the new antenna, but I fiddled till it started up again. Then found the batteries weren't charging from the motor… This is part of an ongoing saga of battery problems, which I thought might all finally be sorted, but.. no! Don't know if it's a problem with the VSR or the Mastervolt or another mystery. Stopping and restarting the motor made the responsible bod behave so they are all charged up again.
However, after some good sleeps, today got off to a rousing start with a nice dolphin fish… didn't manage to land it, but just as well, it was too big for the two of us. So beautiful! I sat down with my morning coffee and made up a short gaff from a big fish hook and the remains of the stupid Italian gaff, so ready for the next one. Pulled out the genaker (that's a sail) and hoisted it while there was no wind. Sorted out where it and it's ropes will go. We'll probably use it a lot in the coming weeks, so good to have it prepared. It's a glorious day, weather is much warmer already, there's a pilot fish hitching a ride on our bow-wave, glassy sea, turtle, lot's of migrating birds and only 176.4 miles to go!
and 10 miles later… we landed a dolphin fish. Sabine (that's the beanie she knitted me) found a the plastic remnant of a lure on the rocks in Italy, I put some hooks on it, and today it finally caught something.
day 5
Morning starts well as some wind finally comes from behind, motor off and away we go. Then away go both reels…. The cheap reel doesn't let out much line, but the TLD25 has braid screaming out despite drag on fairly high. Andy is fast asleep, boat is happily sailing alone at 6kn and it's not going to be easy to stop it. Braid keeps going out so I push up the drag even further. Half the line is out.. push it over into the black zone where it's never been before, hoping to break the lure off but still it goes. Wind in the small fish, it's a nice size mahi mahi, lift him on deck, he unhooks himself and dances a way then up and over the side before I can hurt him. Oh well, one less problem. Braid is still going out, I hold the rod for a while and try to break the lure off by holding the drum with my thumb. I get hot, fish keeps going. Finally he slows so put rod in holder and get some clothes off, by the time i'm back the rod is slung between it's safety rope and the fish, not a pretty sight! The next 40 mins I just hold on, getting the odd six inches of line back then losing it. Fish is having a nice swim, he does lovely white streaks through the waves, 300m from me. This is where the marvellous e-bay Patagonian Toothfish Hook came good. Finally he released himself and I could wind back my line. Thank heavens I wasn't using a Triple SuperGrab NeverLose hook!
Later that day… well it would be good to have a small fish to eat for the next days at anchor? So put them back in and… off go both reels. Braid screaming… then braid not screaming as the ratchet bit flew off the reel and into the 2800m depths! This time I managed to lose the fish before he got much line out, but the cheap reel had a medium fish, and since it hardly works I spent half an hour getting him up from the depths. Patagonian Toothfish Hook then let me go. So arms and legs are seriously sore and I might just use some heavy crash lines for a while!
and there at the bottom is Lanzarote, we've made it to the Canaries. See Martin, it is not yellow!!
Sounds great and looks great. Beautiful coloured water. That stripey fish in the water is a pilot fish - very cool. They usually follow sharks around.
ReplyDeleteThe little tuna - a stripey?