First Leg: Cape Town to St Helena

Finally I can upload this entry that has been saved on the laptop for ages! Many more entries have been written in the meantime and will be posted as and when we get the chance…



Day 1 - 11

I am sitting in the saloon of our yacht, which Pat and I have decided to call “The Temptress”, and reminiscing about the past 11 days that we have spent sailing from Cape Town to our first pit stop in St Helena. We’ll be arriving on the small island on our 12th day and are excited to take a tour of the famous island in the Atlantic Ocean.

The day of our departure (24th August) got really exciting once we were leaving the Elliot Basin to fill up with diesel and a last beer at the refuelling dock. We headed out to sea with Table Mountain fading slowly behind us; it was a magnificent sight and as we passed Robben Island I took my first of many watches at the helm.

After our skipper explained exactly which instruments to monitor and what to keep an eye out for, especially other vessels, it was only Pat and I on deck as the others went below to take a nap. Not long after, we started spotting dolphins and in pairs, they were cruising at the tips of our bow! We leaned over to play with them and they responded to Pat making clicking noises with his fingers. They kept coming and going throughout the rest of the day and later we briefly spotted one whale directly ahead of us that disappeared soon after. It was the best start we could have hoped for and we were keen to see what lay ahead of us.

As yet, I’d only felt a slight queasiness when sailing previously, and only if I was below deck for an extended period of time; nothing serious. Now that we were living on board a boat that was constantly in motion, and it got particularly bumpy with relatively high swells in the first two days, I was definitely getting seasick. I took a nap in the afternoon and Pat woke me for our first meal. I ate, knowing that it wasn’t going to end well. I tried sucking it up and stared out at the horizon as much as possible but my body was not happy with me and I had to run to the heads. Amazingly, as soon as I heaved, I felt 100% better. The next day however it returned quickly and by the third day my body got over it and since then it’s been perfect.

By the first night we’d sailed to Saldhana Bay and on to Cape Columbine, at which point we headed North West towards St Helena, leaving the last sight of land and lights behind us. It was full moon, so we could barely see more stars than we would in a bright city; however as the moon cycle continued the most incredible night skies have been illuminated to us (barring heavy cloud cover on most nights). These have made every night watch more rewarding, along with the phosphorescence in the water as it passes along the bow.

Another exciting fact is that we passed the 0 degree Meridian (Greenwich Mean Line) and crossed over into the Western half of the globe – my first time ever to pass into that part of the world! Also, as we steadily headed further North West, the water temperature noticably increased to all of our delight. Along with the warmer water came, a wide range of interesting and weird creatures: The weird creatures that have been sighted so far include flying fish that crash-land on our boat on a regular basis. “Flocks” of 10 – 60 of the fishes come jumping out of the water as they get near the boat or other bigger fish hunt them. They remain airborne for long distances, barely touching the water, and some head the wrong way – into our boat. Also, we find dried out squid the have been washed onto the foredeck, hundreds of unidentified red eyes at night (possibly more squid that come to the surface to feed?) and many different kinds of pelagic birds that swoop and swerve around our boat with the utmost efficiency – highly entertaining!

Entertainment onboard hasn’t been hard to find either. Between keeping watch, adjusting sails, checking for changes in the weather, reading, cooking, staring out at the vast ocean which is so captivating, fishing (2 tunas so far!), chatting, sleeping and, and, and, we haven’t been bored once. Also, every activity takes time and is done carefully which makes for a very relaxing and interesting experience. We have to live conservatively with water, so our showers consist of hauling buckets of sea water onboard and scrubbing down. The guys do this on deck – a windy place – and need to hold on so they don’t fall off the back. For me, being a girl and having long hair, “showering” is quite a long process. Pat hauls buckets of water for me and passes them down the hatch in our bathroom, where I fill buckets for my wash. It’s quite a balancing act as the yacht is permanently lifting up and down over the swells, even small ones! It feels so good though to wash with salt water as it cleanses the skin and leaves it smooth and fresh.

Every day so much happens that it would be too much detail to relate to you. Even the smallest nuances of living on a boat are new to us, such as walking without falling over as the boat moves, boiling water, having watches in shifts 24/7, and living in a confined space with 2 new people. We’re enjoying it immensely so far and have plenty more to learn before this trip comes to an end – 4 weeks, more or less... We’re taking notes as we go and look fwd to the next leg of our trip after a short break on St Helena. Ciao for now