If we can find ourselves in a deep downwind condition we’ll roll out the twin headsails on barber haulers (don’t even need poles as the boat is wide enough for the two small jibs, both hanked on to a 2-slot single fuller foil) and stow the main sail. With the apparent wind anywhere from astern to up to about 40 degrees either side of the stern the rig moves us along at about 45% of the true wind speed. The seas are then generally on the stern which makes for a nice rising and falling ride unless we also have an adverse swell. Catamarans don’t roll in these conditions fortunately, so it’s a supremely comfortable point of sail, and this rig doesn’t require us going forward or up on the cabin top to mess with reefing lines and such so crew safety is enhanced. If the winds get into the mid 20s or above we can simply furl in part of the twin headsail setup and still be smokin’ along.
Risk is what’s left after we’ve identified and mitigated every hazard we can imagine. My background in experimental flight test involved a lot of risk assessment and mitigation, and this life is no different. A simple injury out here can become life threatening over time, and we’re at least a week from any help ashore so we really try to be careful.
We have some PredictWind preferences and polar inputs that help with the planning routine, and when PredictWind gets it right we generally come in around 10% of the estimate, so not too bad.
For comfort settings we avoid winds of 25 knots on all points of sail.
We also avoid upwind seas greater than 2.5 meters, reaching seas greater than 3 meters, and downwind seas greater than 5 meters.
Our polar inputs for 15 knots of wind and moderate seas are: upwind 50deg 5.5 knots, reaching 90 deg 7.5 knots and downwind 160 deg 7 knots
Something really important on a passage like this is to stop thinking about how long it will take or how many miles will be sailed. Rather, how do we keep moving in a direction that accommodates the weather, keeps us safe and comfortable, minimizes upwind sailing, and hopefully moves us closer to our objective. Lately we’ve been sailing Northwest when our objective is Northeast, but that’s what the wind will allow and given the current forecast it seems that getting as far North as possible as fast as possible to avoid getting trapped in a developing blue zone is a heck of a lot more important than making any Easting towards our arrival objective. Once we finally get established in the Westerly winds we’ll get all that Easting done with a minimum of stress on ourselves and the vessel.
A final consideration is the great Pacific garbage patch, generally centered between Hawaii and San Francisco. There’s a lot of old rope and fishing gear floating on or just below the surface and if we were to find ourselves becalmed in an area populated by that kind of debris, motoring might be quite hazardous as wrapping a prop with a net or line is a really destructive thing. We experienced that once in the Caribbean while working as passage crew on a Swan 82. Wrapped a chunk of synthetic fishing net in the night, stopped the diesel cold. Net melted around the prop shaft and took quite some time to cut away with the best kitchen knife the chef had. That would have been Nicola. She wasn’t happy.
So now you know about as much as we do, and you’re sitting in a comfortable chair in a comfortable house that isn’t pitching and rolling and having the occasional wave break against it so that spray flies over the top of the saloon and salts up the solar panels. It’s perhaps a lot different from playing with a virtual Vendee Globe or whatnot, but this is real life cruising. If you ever thought you’d like to try this someday, above are somethings we’ve learned over the past 7 years.
We’d love to hear back from you - Isabel gets a big kick out of hearing me read emails from friends and family.
Jollydogsrcc@myiridium.net
Cheers!
Mark & Isabel
From the sea
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