One Year Since Fremantle Departure

Hi everyone,
Today is the first anniversary of our departure from Fremantle.  It has been a foggy day here in Horta, perfect for boat work.

Zen Again at anchor in Horta harbour

We spent the last two days doing more post-arrival boat work including:

• Filled diesel jerry cans (@1euro/litre)
• Filled water jerry cans (free)
• On deck s/s cleaning
• Food stocktake and visit to the local supermarket
• Emptied, cleaned and repacked cockpit lockers
• Laundry
• Changed engine impeller (still looking perfect after 300 hours so kept as spare)
• Cleaned gas hob burner assemblies and nozzles (apres le deluge)
• Emptied, cleaned and repacked the quarterberth

It's hard to believe we've been cruising for a year already.  In some ways it seems like we left only yesterday but home does seems a very long way away.  It has been a busy but amazing year full of wonderful experiences.

Fremantle to Horta

In the 365 days we:

• logged 16,260nm (44nm/day)
• were at sea for 2924 hours (122 days or 33% or 133nm/day) 
• slept ashore for 14 days (all while touring in South Africa)
• ran the engine for 435 hours (18 days or 15% of sea time)
• consumed 800 litres of diesel
• consumed about 30 kg of propane gas
• consumed about 7 litres of fresh water daily while at sea
• cleared in/out of 14 jurisdictions

Good kit included:

• Ken Hayashi designed / Yamazaki Yachts built ST10.4 (ie the boat)
• Manson Supreme anchor
• Aries vane gear (30 years old and still going strong)
• Extreme Sails mainsail (those deep reefs are fantastic)
• Raymarine SPX5 autopilot (except ram/actuator)
• Iridium GO!
• Vesper XB8000 AIS transceiver with WiFi
• Icom IC-M802 HF/SSB
• Macbook Air computers (in general and apps OpenCPN, PW Offshore, DX Toolbox)
• iPads (in general and apps SEAiq, iNavX, WeatherTrack, GoSkyWatch)
• GoogleEarth imagery on OpenCPN and SEAiq
• SodaStream carbonator
• Force10 stove

Failures and notable wear included:

• Two Raymarine SPX5-GP autopilot rams/actuators
• Raymarine SeaTalk/NMEA0183 Interface Box (lightning near miss)
• Anchor chain replaced due to poor refurbishment job in Fremantle
• Lost two fenders (literally ripped away while in windy Simon's Town)
• Two gas detector sensors
• Masthead tricolour/anchor light
• Compass backlight
• Several lifejacket/danbuoy CO2 canisters
• Mainsail headboard carriage fractured
• Significant wear on the "yankee" headsail
• Chafing of the staysail foot (by lazy headsail sheet)
• Chafing of headsail halyard
• Significant wear on headsail sheet and boom brake lines
• Chafing of boom-bag where it rubs against the aft lower shrouds
• Hull topsides "fender rub" (while in Simon's Town)
• Sheath on Icom HF/SSB and Garmin VHF microphone cables disintegrated
• Wore out several ensigns - last one now looking very tatty

Engine parts and consumables included:

• 20 litres of engine oil, 1 litre of gearbox oil, 4 litres of engine coolant
• 6 oil filters, 5 fuel primary filters and 4 fuel secondary filters
• 2 V-belts
• 2 raw water pump impellers

We only have a few more weeks of cruising to go.  Once we reach the UK we'll be seeking jobs to pay for it all! ;)  We are looking forward to cruising around Europe when circumstances allow.  We expect to continue to live aboard.

On Eating Our Elephant

Hi everyone,

Previously I've mentioned "eating the elephant", or how we're planning to break down our cruise to Cape Town this year.  Clearly, the only way to eat an elephant is:

1.  Piece by Piece; and

2.  Without undue regard to the amount still to eat.

The following "elephant pie" charts illustrate the menu by size (distance) and duration (time enroute and resting).  The total distance is approx 6800nm.  The total planned duration is 6 months - June to December.

So distance-wise we are on target, having reached the 3 o'clock point so far.

Likewise, we are on schedule time-wise - exactly if we arrive on Friday!

We've allowed a week for each stage along the South African coast but this is an average.  We expect to move along the coast as weather allows, stopping only where bad weather dictates.  Exceptions are Knysna and Simon's Town which we'd really like to visit.

Few plans survive contact with reality, but so far so good!

Some reading this will say "shouldn't he be on lookout or something?".  Good point.