Simon's Town to Cape Town

Hi everyone,
Yesterday we did the 60nm passage from Simon's Town to Cape Town.  We departed at 0545 and winds were light from Simon's Town down toward the cape so we had to motor.  Around the capes we had a nice NW wind which allowed us to sail around Cape Point and the Cape of Good Hope.  From there we we had a wind which flowed directly down the coast and we had to motor to ensure we arrived in daylight.

Here are our track and speed profile.  Note we kept sailing for a little while after rounding the capes before deciding sailing to Cape Town was going to be a slow process.  We ended up motoring at 2400rpm to get there in daylight.  We normally motor at 2000rpm so this was a good workout for the engine.

Zen Again track

Zen Again speed

The sail around the two capes was spectacular.  Cape Point is much higher than the Cape of Good Hope.  There are a couple of offshore reefs which we sailed inshore of.  Bellows Reef was breaking heavily, even in a low swell.  Anvil Rock wasn't breaking and could easily catch you out.

PredictWind offers a high-resolution GRIB of the cape area.  The lees and acceleration zones produced by the high hills on the peninsula are very significant to sailors and are only represented in this type of GRIB.  Here's an example...

High-Reolution GRIB file showing "lees" created by the hilly cape

We sailed in company with UK yacht Sara II and Netherlands yacht Geramar.  We were the only one of the three who sailed around the cape.  Motoring around allowed them to overtake us though!

Rounding Cape Point (Cape of Good Hope at left)

Rounding Cape of Good Hope (at left) with sv Sara II inshore

The passage up the peninsula to Cape Town was tedious.  Motoring into a light breeze is frustrating.  We motored through several light fog banks which reduced visibility to around 0.5nm.  The water went from 20C to 13C as we rounded the capes which no-doubt contributed to fog formation.

For most of the passage it was overcast.  The sun only came out for an hour or so as we rounded the capes.  The wind was somewhat chilly.

We arrived in Table Bay at about 1600 and found a number of yachts out sailing for the afternoon.  Most of them appeared to be tourist boats.  Entry into the port was straight-forward.  We called the Swing Bridge on VHF71 and joined the set of boats entering the V&A Marina at 1645.  There are two bridges to pass through and they are controlled together.

We were assisted in berthing by the crew of US yacht Andiamo who we haven't seen since Reunion.  They sailed from Richards Bay direct to Cape Town, arriving only a few days ago.

Entering Cape Town port

Zen Again in V&A Marina, Cape Town

We really enjoyed our month at Simon's Town.  The people at FBYC are very friendly and put on some great welcome parties for the cruisers.  Wandering ashore to one of Simon' Town's many cafes, restaurants and pubs was totally safe.  It seems the only thing one needs to be very careful about is people "helping" you at ATMs, although we never encountered such con-artists.

It rained overnight as the tip of a cold front came through.  That helped clean the Simon's Town dirt off the upper part of the rig.

It's great to be moored in the middle of Cape Town and at our "jumping off" point for our South Atlantic crossing.  We expect to stay here for several days to do our final shopping and preparations.  We expect to move briefly to RCYC's marina, but only to clear out for St Helena.

Simon's Town - Exploring Cape Town

Hi everyone,
While Zen Again is in Simon's Town enduring high winds we've been exploring Cape Town.  Last week we stayed over for one night and this week we are staying for two.  Cape Town has plenty to see and do!

Last week we visited the Castle of Good Hope.  This spectacular fort dates back to the 17th century and houses a very interesting military museum inside.

Castle of Good Hope

We also visited the South African Museum which seems focussed on natural history but also has an excellent display of rock art.  The animal displays are very interesting too.

Spectacular rock art

We took a ride on the CitySightseeing red route bus which took us across town, up to the cable car lower station and then west to Camps Bay.  We hopped off in Camps Bay and had a great lunch while enjoying the view across the beach.

Camps Bay beach

Yesterday we spent much of the day at the Kirstenbosch Botanical Gardens.  These extensive gardens reminded us of Kings Park in Perth.  But while Kings Park has plants from all over the world Kirstenbosch has purely South African plants.  That's because southern Africa has an amazing diversity of plants, being considered one of only six floral kingdoms globally.

Kirstenbosch is overlooked by spectacular hills

Fanfare Heath (type of Erica fynbos)

Leucospermum

Erica fynbos

Agapanthus

Boomslang ("tree snake") boardwalk

One of many sculptures in the gardens

Today we visited the National Gallery.  It has a large display of art from during and after apartheid in addition to the usual old paintings.

A  Grim Reaper constructed of computer bits - Cyber Reaper?

Powerful anti-apartheid imagery

Extraordinarily colourful art

Interesting sculptures too

In between all this culture we've been enjoying some of the many cafes and pubs around Cape Town. There are quite a few craft (micro-brewery) beers available.  Most are pretty good!

Simon's Town - Autopilot Modifications

Hi everyone,
As mentioned in several posts previously (in particular here), we've had problems with our autopilot rams.  We have two complete Raymarine SPX5 systems with two Type 3 tiller rams. Two rams have lasted only 5000nm or so each.

The Raymarine man here in Simon's Town is very good and seems well connected with senior Raymarine staff in the US.  He looked at the system configuration - both software and hardware - and made several recommendations.  We have now completed implementing them all.

First we changed several configuration parameters, all of which are Dealer Calibration settings.  Our original calibration runs (separately for the two systems) resulted in Rudder Gain and Counter Rudder settings being set very high.

Rudder Gain reduced

Counter Rudder reduced

Rudder Damping unchanged

Secondly we had two s/s brackets manufactured.  These allow us to mount the ram on either port or starboard sides.  Keeping the ram on the windward side is recommended since it reduces arm extension which (we're told) should reduce wear-accelerating vibrations.  The mounts move the entire ram inboard which eliminates the 150mm arm extension we previously used.  This should further reduce vibration.

Thirdly we had a second pin fitted to the tiller, matching second mounting points on the two brackets.  These allow us to fit the rams 150mm further aft.  This gives us some redundancy (in case one of the pins detaches for example) and may perform better in some conditions.

Modified tiller with new brackets port & starboard

While here we've also discovered a company which manufactures "drop in replacement" rams.  Pelagic Autopilot appears to have a good reputation and I'm told their rams are longer-lasting.  We may well give them a try if the above changes don't stop our Raymarine rams wearing out prematurely.  Thanks to Jim of Canadian sv Haulback for the tip!


Other boat work done recently includes:

• replacing two lost/damaged fenders
• purchased iNavX Navionics charts for Caribbean and Europe
• generated GoogleEarth imagery for Windward and Leeward Caribbean islands