Black Sheep
Well-known member
Re: Update 9th May
No mention of spotting the school? I reckon they passed about 20 miles away...
No mention of spotting the school? I reckon they passed about 20 miles away...
Mojomo Update
- Thread starter tome
- Start date
tome
New member
Re: Update 10th May
Thursday 10th May
37deg17N 33deg8.2W.
Several days of favourable winds and nice beam wind sailing ended yesterday with the forecast which we thought had been rescinded .coming true. So yesterday afternoon we gybed, reefed, and then with up to F6 gusting 30knots from the northeast and rain, a second reef. Boat trammelled along at up to 10knots most of the night just 40 degrees off the wind. Para was jolly impressed, even flabbergasted. Para is superb when flabbergasted.
Wet weather gear on all round, quite a lairy ride. PWC just avoided a giant tree trunk on his eveing watch (well, he saw it 50 yards off to stbd after it had gone past..) and later played Onedin Line, Wagner and other suitable tunes on cockpit speakers for full-on Atlantic storm effect. This morning we found one of the horseshoe buoy things has been carried off in the wind.
Waited all night for the wind to back to NW as promised by para.but still only just moving to N now F3 mid-morning.
6 am this morning all much calmer than 12hours previously, but I'd had enough waiting and our speed under 6knots would mean arriving horta friday after dark. So engine on and now pointing around 72T to Horta, due there daytime tomorrow Friday.
Not too much further to report aside from the hefty dose of sailing as above.and I hear by satphone that some people don't like to hear of our joking around? Sorry. But I'm afraid I won't permit a no-fun regime. And of course, the time to be worried might be when your skipper permits no frivolity whatsoever ...because it likely means that they're not at all sure what they're doing, and/or frightened and/or possibly just a miserable git in the first place - or all of the above. None of which applies here.
-tcm
Thursday 10th May
37deg17N 33deg8.2W.
Several days of favourable winds and nice beam wind sailing ended yesterday with the forecast which we thought had been rescinded .coming true. So yesterday afternoon we gybed, reefed, and then with up to F6 gusting 30knots from the northeast and rain, a second reef. Boat trammelled along at up to 10knots most of the night just 40 degrees off the wind. Para was jolly impressed, even flabbergasted. Para is superb when flabbergasted.
Wet weather gear on all round, quite a lairy ride. PWC just avoided a giant tree trunk on his eveing watch (well, he saw it 50 yards off to stbd after it had gone past..) and later played Onedin Line, Wagner and other suitable tunes on cockpit speakers for full-on Atlantic storm effect. This morning we found one of the horseshoe buoy things has been carried off in the wind.
Waited all night for the wind to back to NW as promised by para.but still only just moving to N now F3 mid-morning.
6 am this morning all much calmer than 12hours previously, but I'd had enough waiting and our speed under 6knots would mean arriving horta friday after dark. So engine on and now pointing around 72T to Horta, due there daytime tomorrow Friday.
Not too much further to report aside from the hefty dose of sailing as above.and I hear by satphone that some people don't like to hear of our joking around? Sorry. But I'm afraid I won't permit a no-fun regime. And of course, the time to be worried might be when your skipper permits no frivolity whatsoever ...because it likely means that they're not at all sure what they're doing, and/or frightened and/or possibly just a miserable git in the first place - or all of the above. None of which applies here.
-tcm
JKay
New member
Re: Update 10th May
await the next report with baited breath
Thanks for all your effort Tome
cheers Joe
await the next report with baited breath
Thanks for all your effort Tome
cheers Joe
Twister_Ken
Well-known member
Re: Update 10th May
Will they have grown beards?
Will they have grown beards?
JKay
New member
Re: Update 10th May
Na! they got their philips shavers onboard
cheers Joe
Na! they got their philips shavers onboard
cheers Joe
tome
New member
The One that got away
For reasons unfathomable to me a new message appeared in my inbox today (was empty) from Mojomo dated 5th May. Although a few days old, I include it for the sake of a complete picture - tome
=====================================================
Re: saturday, not so many funnies, sorry.
Saturday 5th May 8am local, 1pm BST, 33deg 16N, 50deg 28 W
As soon as I'd sent yesterday's email, the wind died so engine on again and
motorsailing. 100 hours motoring so far, all on port engine. We've had 8-12
knots wind over the past 24 hours, but up again to 16-18 knots this morning.
Para always seems to have a good watch, and frequently hands over with the
boat bowling along at eight knots or more. But it often falls apart as soon
as he's off watch. It's happening again today with wind dropping - and he's
not back on watch now until Sunday, dammit. However, we've been sailing
along at 7-9 knots for past four hours now, not bad at all with 15-20 knots
behind the beam, rolling along in 1-2m swell. I think this would be a lot
less comfy in normal monohull boat tho - each swell rocks us a fair bit even
with two hulls and 8 metre beam.
Boring fuel calculating/worrying paragraph. For this route at this time of
year, the winds can be light or even non-existent, and hence the routing
advice prior to starting the trip pointed towards stashing plenty of spare
fuel. So I bought four twenty-litre plastic jerrycans. Bit more thinking,
and I went back and bought ten more. The day before we left I thought what
the heck and bought another eight, also found one from the previous owner,
giving us 460 litres of spare fuel on top of the 650 litres in the tanks -
1100 litres total. The boat can do 8 knots with both engines 2000 rpm and
uses total 7 litres an hour, giving range with spare fuel of just over 150
hours or 1200miles - enough for almost half the total trip distance of 2600
miles. But we lost the wind only two days out from St Martin, much earlier
than we had hoped. However, motorsailing on one engine gives us 6 knots and
massive range of 300 hours and 1800miles. Horta's now 1100 miles away and we
could *just* about motor there with the 750litres of fuel remaining. But a
couple of days under sail will solve any concerns- and this seems to be day
one.
For first six days of the trip the sun blazed away, and I found inventive
ways of constructing sun shades attached to bimini (unofficially called "tee
cee ems" somewhere in ybw forums I believe) to protect people on helm and in
the cockpit. These shades mainly involve bedsheets, duvet covers, twangy
cord and clothes pegs. Now and again the need adjusting and I ask LJS to
"give me a hand with the sheets" or "help me adjust the sheets" which is a
fairly funny sailing joke for the first dozen times anyway. No need for
these lately though, as the weather turned very not-Caribbean yesterday, bit
of a drenching with rain for an hour, and a bit overcast today too.
All crew in fine form. Para is looking much more tanned that normal, almost
as brown as LJS. Oh, and although I had a go with dental repair kit as per
website pic, we found a real dentist in St Martin for LJS, 30 euros, no
waiting. Pwc said he was off down to the park for a few hours, but he's
actually sunbathing on the foredeck. Naturally, I flung a few buckets of
water that way but seems he thinks that just normal spray. Or maybe he goes
to some really lousy rainy places for his holidays.
My turn cooking yesterday, and since we had egg whites, tinned fruit and UHT
cream, paddy suggested I have go at making pavolva. Unfortunately, despite
excellent shore sport team (I bet that Ellen MacArthur's lot can't text back
pavlova recipes within 30 seconds eh?) I couldn't get the flippin eggs to
whisk up properly with the Bosch/fork whisk. Using the "hammer action"
setting didn't make any difference either, and I gave it up as a bad job
when the fork bit fell out and splattered eggy foam around the galley. I did
manage to make poached fish in cider cream for lunch which was jolly good.
Crew all seem to be quite expert cooks though not actually chosen that way.
Microwave unused so far, proper cooking and nobody has descended to Fray
Bentos pies yet. Altho my erm spag bol followed by tinned fruit came pretty
close, and I had to use stuff from the "Admit it, you're rubbish at cooking"
cupboard.
Overall the boat seems very good. Nothing falling off and there are plenty
of well thought-out ideas too. Internally there's tons of room - we brought
3 weeks of food for four on board and boatily stashed it in bilges, and then
found that loads of the normal cupboards are empty. Frigoboat fridge and
freezer especially recommended, smart stainless steel and essentially
silent. The freezer was accidentally set to minus 30 degrees and seemed to
get there too with everything frozen as a single lump.
But the radar isn't helping us very much. It didn't "see" either of the only
two vessels encountered so far that required us to alter course. I said I'd
be nice about Raymarine, but radar that pretends to be working with the
whirly icon - but sometimes showed no trace when only 3 miles from a big
ship is not great. Bit useless in fact. We don't have ships around during
daylight (mostly) so can't check and be sure it's working all the time. It
seems to sometimes drop the signal and when radar screen alone is chosen
(instead of overlaid chart as we use normally, to see AIS) it says "no data",
altho restarting it seems to fix it again. Since most times it's fine it won't
be easy to show or diagnose a fault. Perhaps the best 100%-sorted option
might be to install another completely independent radar system as a check.
I'm hoping that people at home are a bit less worried than they were? We
found the tracker thing was unplugged yesterday, so sorry about that. Also
LJS says there was a call but we all missed it. We must have been out
shopping or something. The boat is hugely safe (pwc has been reading the
multihull book) and the whole idea is to see what the trip is like - not to
see if it's possible. It's not an unknown exploration thing at the limits of
endurance or feasibility. And of all the times to do the trip, this time of
year May-June is the most recommended for good weather. Whereas those other
times earlier in the year with catamarans having a bad time near Bermuda was
the very opposite - it's specifically suggested *not* to go near Bermuda in
February. So, no more fretting please. Or a bit less.
For reasons unfathomable to me a new message appeared in my inbox today (was empty) from Mojomo dated 5th May. Although a few days old, I include it for the sake of a complete picture - tome
=====================================================
Re: saturday, not so many funnies, sorry.
Saturday 5th May 8am local, 1pm BST, 33deg 16N, 50deg 28 W
As soon as I'd sent yesterday's email, the wind died so engine on again and
motorsailing. 100 hours motoring so far, all on port engine. We've had 8-12
knots wind over the past 24 hours, but up again to 16-18 knots this morning.
Para always seems to have a good watch, and frequently hands over with the
boat bowling along at eight knots or more. But it often falls apart as soon
as he's off watch. It's happening again today with wind dropping - and he's
not back on watch now until Sunday, dammit. However, we've been sailing
along at 7-9 knots for past four hours now, not bad at all with 15-20 knots
behind the beam, rolling along in 1-2m swell. I think this would be a lot
less comfy in normal monohull boat tho - each swell rocks us a fair bit even
with two hulls and 8 metre beam.
Boring fuel calculating/worrying paragraph. For this route at this time of
year, the winds can be light or even non-existent, and hence the routing
advice prior to starting the trip pointed towards stashing plenty of spare
fuel. So I bought four twenty-litre plastic jerrycans. Bit more thinking,
and I went back and bought ten more. The day before we left I thought what
the heck and bought another eight, also found one from the previous owner,
giving us 460 litres of spare fuel on top of the 650 litres in the tanks -
1100 litres total. The boat can do 8 knots with both engines 2000 rpm and
uses total 7 litres an hour, giving range with spare fuel of just over 150
hours or 1200miles - enough for almost half the total trip distance of 2600
miles. But we lost the wind only two days out from St Martin, much earlier
than we had hoped. However, motorsailing on one engine gives us 6 knots and
massive range of 300 hours and 1800miles. Horta's now 1100 miles away and we
could *just* about motor there with the 750litres of fuel remaining. But a
couple of days under sail will solve any concerns- and this seems to be day
one.
For first six days of the trip the sun blazed away, and I found inventive
ways of constructing sun shades attached to bimini (unofficially called "tee
cee ems" somewhere in ybw forums I believe) to protect people on helm and in
the cockpit. These shades mainly involve bedsheets, duvet covers, twangy
cord and clothes pegs. Now and again the need adjusting and I ask LJS to
"give me a hand with the sheets" or "help me adjust the sheets" which is a
fairly funny sailing joke for the first dozen times anyway. No need for
these lately though, as the weather turned very not-Caribbean yesterday, bit
of a drenching with rain for an hour, and a bit overcast today too.
All crew in fine form. Para is looking much more tanned that normal, almost
as brown as LJS. Oh, and although I had a go with dental repair kit as per
website pic, we found a real dentist in St Martin for LJS, 30 euros, no
waiting. Pwc said he was off down to the park for a few hours, but he's
actually sunbathing on the foredeck. Naturally, I flung a few buckets of
water that way but seems he thinks that just normal spray. Or maybe he goes
to some really lousy rainy places for his holidays.
My turn cooking yesterday, and since we had egg whites, tinned fruit and UHT
cream, paddy suggested I have go at making pavolva. Unfortunately, despite
excellent shore sport team (I bet that Ellen MacArthur's lot can't text back
pavlova recipes within 30 seconds eh?) I couldn't get the flippin eggs to
whisk up properly with the Bosch/fork whisk. Using the "hammer action"
setting didn't make any difference either, and I gave it up as a bad job
when the fork bit fell out and splattered eggy foam around the galley. I did
manage to make poached fish in cider cream for lunch which was jolly good.
Crew all seem to be quite expert cooks though not actually chosen that way.
Microwave unused so far, proper cooking and nobody has descended to Fray
Bentos pies yet. Altho my erm spag bol followed by tinned fruit came pretty
close, and I had to use stuff from the "Admit it, you're rubbish at cooking"
cupboard.
Overall the boat seems very good. Nothing falling off and there are plenty
of well thought-out ideas too. Internally there's tons of room - we brought
3 weeks of food for four on board and boatily stashed it in bilges, and then
found that loads of the normal cupboards are empty. Frigoboat fridge and
freezer especially recommended, smart stainless steel and essentially
silent. The freezer was accidentally set to minus 30 degrees and seemed to
get there too with everything frozen as a single lump.
But the radar isn't helping us very much. It didn't "see" either of the only
two vessels encountered so far that required us to alter course. I said I'd
be nice about Raymarine, but radar that pretends to be working with the
whirly icon - but sometimes showed no trace when only 3 miles from a big
ship is not great. Bit useless in fact. We don't have ships around during
daylight (mostly) so can't check and be sure it's working all the time. It
seems to sometimes drop the signal and when radar screen alone is chosen
(instead of overlaid chart as we use normally, to see AIS) it says "no data",
altho restarting it seems to fix it again. Since most times it's fine it won't
be easy to show or diagnose a fault. Perhaps the best 100%-sorted option
might be to install another completely independent radar system as a check.
I'm hoping that people at home are a bit less worried than they were? We
found the tracker thing was unplugged yesterday, so sorry about that. Also
LJS says there was a call but we all missed it. We must have been out
shopping or something. The boat is hugely safe (pwc has been reading the
multihull book) and the whole idea is to see what the trip is like - not to
see if it's possible. It's not an unknown exploration thing at the limits of
endurance or feasibility. And of all the times to do the trip, this time of
year May-June is the most recommended for good weather. Whereas those other
times earlier in the year with catamarans having a bad time near Bermuda was
the very opposite - it's specifically suggested *not* to go near Bermuda in
February. So, no more fretting please. Or a bit less.
tome
New member
Re: Update 10th May
Glad you're enjoying it Joe. Talked to them tonight for the first time since leaving and they are in great spirits due Horta tomorrow late pm
They then have a more challenging leg (where the weather could play a bigger influence) to get the boat back to Les Sables d'Olonne to investigate rudder etc
Guessing they will kick off the next leg Sunday and arrive Sablon around 21st/22nd
Glad you're enjoying it Joe. Talked to them tonight for the first time since leaving and they are in great spirits due Horta tomorrow late pm
They then have a more challenging leg (where the weather could play a bigger influence) to get the boat back to Les Sables d'Olonne to investigate rudder etc
Guessing they will kick off the next leg Sunday and arrive Sablon around 21st/22nd
BrendanS
Well-known member
Re: Update 10th May
I love these 'live' from boat adventures too. Great stuff!
I love these 'live' from boat adventures too. Great stuff!
jimi
Well-known member
Re: Update 10th May
Spoke to Mojo tonight, apparently they are funding the trip by acting as an offshore call centre. I bought 2kg of frozen water from something other than a waterlog, hope that helps. Their navigation strategy involves avoidance of hadards to shipping cos they are baaaaaaaad!
Spoke to Mojo tonight, apparently they are funding the trip by acting as an offshore call centre. I bought 2kg of frozen water from something other than a waterlog, hope that helps. Their navigation strategy involves avoidance of hadards to shipping cos they are baaaaaaaad!
BrendanS
Well-known member
Re: Update 10th May
[ QUOTE ]
Spoke to Mojo tonight, apparently they are funding the trip by acting as an offshore call centre.
[/ QUOTE ]
I bet Matt and Para are loving that bit.
[ QUOTE ]
Spoke to Mojo tonight, apparently they are funding the trip by acting as an offshore call centre.
[/ QUOTE ]
I bet Matt and Para are loving that bit.
tome
New member
Leg One Concludes...
Friday 11th May 9am local 10 am BST
38deg35N 29deg35W, Horta 50 miles away. 8knots, 72T
Yesterday a complete contrast with the previous windy days - warm sunshine.
Calmer winds from well behind the beam, so motorsailing the last 300 miles to Azores. PWC has guessed we will arrive off Horta at 1400 Friday (today), and I've adjusted speed and course to arrive at the chosen spot within a few minutes of that time.
A relaxed sunny day, but para was very industrious and started making his flippin bread again. Huh! He is far too pleased with his new-found bread making skill, a lost art you know, should be passed through generations, shop-bought bread pah! etc etc. Paddy and I secretly wondered how the bread would turn out if there was far too much yeast? Good question. So whilst para went to find more ingredients and paddy engaged him in conversation I added a whole sachet of yeast to the mix. Para returned and continued to make hopefully-exploding bread with about five times more yeast than the recipe advised. Paddy managed to keep a straight face and quizzed para about the detail of the recipe, and how would too much yeast affect things? Para warned darkly of dire consequences such as hugely over-risen loaf, and insisted that the exact quantities were vital. Tee hee. We imagined that perhaps we would have to dig the bread out of the oven, possibly even buy a new oven. But then - the bread came out perfectly! And tasted fine too.
Dang. Which was almost (but not quite) as funny. I admitted our failed prank to Para, who has promised retribution.
We also have to apologise to jimi, for giving him a dreadful mid-Atlantic fright of nightmare proportions. Feigning the transatlantic accent of an Iridium satellite telephone operator, we got pwc to call jimi's mobile and ask if he would accept a reverse charge call. Poor jimi. It sounded as though he fainted dead on the spot, but he just managed to squeak "no" and hang up. I only hope he has recovered with no secondary shock. It was cruel and thoughtless of us, and we can only say sorry again for threatening him with a gigantic phone bill.
Heyho. Not much else to report. Proper 2-3 metre rolling swell now from the north, Horta this afternoon and the end of the first leg. Do we shake hands to greet people in the Azores - or kiss both cheeks? The useless almanacs and guidebooks don't actually tell me anything about this famous "Azores Hi"
Friday 11th May 9am local 10 am BST
38deg35N 29deg35W, Horta 50 miles away. 8knots, 72T
Yesterday a complete contrast with the previous windy days - warm sunshine.
Calmer winds from well behind the beam, so motorsailing the last 300 miles to Azores. PWC has guessed we will arrive off Horta at 1400 Friday (today), and I've adjusted speed and course to arrive at the chosen spot within a few minutes of that time.
A relaxed sunny day, but para was very industrious and started making his flippin bread again. Huh! He is far too pleased with his new-found bread making skill, a lost art you know, should be passed through generations, shop-bought bread pah! etc etc. Paddy and I secretly wondered how the bread would turn out if there was far too much yeast? Good question. So whilst para went to find more ingredients and paddy engaged him in conversation I added a whole sachet of yeast to the mix. Para returned and continued to make hopefully-exploding bread with about five times more yeast than the recipe advised. Paddy managed to keep a straight face and quizzed para about the detail of the recipe, and how would too much yeast affect things? Para warned darkly of dire consequences such as hugely over-risen loaf, and insisted that the exact quantities were vital. Tee hee. We imagined that perhaps we would have to dig the bread out of the oven, possibly even buy a new oven. But then - the bread came out perfectly! And tasted fine too.
Dang. Which was almost (but not quite) as funny. I admitted our failed prank to Para, who has promised retribution.
We also have to apologise to jimi, for giving him a dreadful mid-Atlantic fright of nightmare proportions. Feigning the transatlantic accent of an Iridium satellite telephone operator, we got pwc to call jimi's mobile and ask if he would accept a reverse charge call. Poor jimi. It sounded as though he fainted dead on the spot, but he just managed to squeak "no" and hang up. I only hope he has recovered with no secondary shock. It was cruel and thoughtless of us, and we can only say sorry again for threatening him with a gigantic phone bill.
Heyho. Not much else to report. Proper 2-3 metre rolling swell now from the north, Horta this afternoon and the end of the first leg. Do we shake hands to greet people in the Azores - or kiss both cheeks? The useless almanacs and guidebooks don't actually tell me anything about this famous "Azores Hi"
tome
New member
Message from Matt via mobile phone
Yo! 10 miles off
Yo! 10 miles off
zefender
Active member
Re: Message from Matt via mobile phone
Just got text from PWC - 18 miles to go - blimey just how big is Mojomo!
Just got text from PWC - 18 miles to go - blimey just how big is Mojomo!
AIDY
Active member
Re: Message from Matt via mobile phone
I make that 8 miles long... matts on the bow with the GPS and PWC is steering..
well done chaps and congrats on a safe transat / landfall
I make that 8 miles long... matts on the bow with the GPS and PWC is steering..
well done chaps and congrats on a safe transat / landfall
zefender
Active member
Re: Message from Matt via mobile phone
Well given the time difference between the texts and the speed they're travelling, it'll be at least that then!
Well given the time difference between the texts and the speed they're travelling, it'll be at least that then!
jhr
Well-known member
Re: Message from Matt via mobile phone
I reckon one's taken a reading from GPS satellites and the other is trialling Galileo. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif
I reckon one's taken a reading from GPS satellites and the other is trialling Galileo. /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif
zefender
Active member
Re: Message from Matt via mobile phone
Maybe they're just using a passage chart and thick pencils (low tech option) /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif
Maybe they're just using a passage chart and thick pencils (low tech option) /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif
BrendanS
Well-known member
Re: Message from Matt via mobile phone
Sextants I reckon! /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif
Sextants I reckon! /forums/images/graemlins/smile.gif
Lakesailor
New member
Re: Message from Matt via mobile phone
boo, just searched for a webcam at Horta. Lots of promises, no delivery. Anyone else find one ( my Portugese is a bit rusty)?
boo, just searched for a webcam at Horta. Lots of promises, no delivery. Anyone else find one ( my Portugese is a bit rusty)?