uk-med trip - lessons learned

tcm

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nav: don't need to do very much of this too much in advance. Moose#1 used his puter and listed zillions of lovely waypoints and planned to click past each one. Before we went i thought that it was all very fine, and i was all for planning fuel tankers to meet us a month in advance.

But in practice from where he had to leave us, the weather was not so good, and we headed west to la coruna and in toughish wind stayed 2 miles offshore using radar around headlands and went into lots of bays to avoid the swells and do 20+ knots instead of 12 or less. Then, we went to lots of ports we hadn't planned to visit, and just plugged in a "near enuf" offshore waypoint 2 miles from the marina, sometimes from the almanac, sometimes not. To an extent, lots of waypoints - especially those in the middle of the sea - *might* be an indication of someone who would like the sea to be like roads on land - it gives the impression of order and safety. "yes, we go to this junction, then head west to this waypoint, then etc etc...." but the sea isn't like that and in some cases (massive fog) we had to move way offshore during daylight hours to keep clear of fishing boats who loved the flat water, completley spoiling a plan for a direct route.

food. Tons of food that people like is a Big Thing. Easy food is bacon sarnies, spag bol etc. In tough weather, mars bars, chocy biccies, limitless orange juice. Clive arrived with cokes and fanta - a real treat. We eased up in reasonable weather and eventually cooked at sea almost regardless rather than "grinnned and beared it" until the next port - which engenders a spirit of "phew" when yo0u arrive and means everyone is reluctant to set out until the next bright sunny morning.

water:big tanks are for nice long showers, but i think slow the boat down. Most places have water, so we ran on emergency levels most of the time.

money: some places do indeed only take cash for fuel, so at least enuf money for two fillups is needed. Fortunately, these days, it's all the same currency...

mechanicals: especially on a short hol on a boat, there's a tendency to say to yerself "well, phew, it all seems to work..." which is not wrong, but on the longer trip i found it wasn't good enuf - others were (fortunately) more picky and asked questions which pointed to potential problems.

mechanicals 2: aside from the motive power, lack of radar and night lights would have stopped us dead. I had spare lights, and long distance wd consider spare radar bits. And praps a whole nuther radar set for a long-distancing liveaboard boat.

Chartplotters are fun items - a bit irrelevant other than to check yerv entered a waypoint correctly, and mostly useful to answer the "how far to go" question. If any distance offshore, the screen is blank with small dot/arrow until looking at very wide pic.

Charts are not fun items, and include lots of notes that aren't on the e-charts.

Long-distance motorboating is sort-of ideal for "chancers" - let's go/let's stop/let's go somewhere else... are decisions that probably should be exercised all the time, and we did.

It was v useful to have done a course (like at suncoast) that teaches you to drive (ie berth) a two-engine boat with one engine busted or otherwise indisposed. It helps even more if you have a bowthruster! But don't tell suncoast fer crissakes...

I never chanced the fuel levels, as a full tank gives more options. the crew tried to chance it, but we had to turn in to a fuel dock,. and a very good job we did too as wind blew up and we were at sea an extra 3 hours.

Fishing boats and ships might be professionals but are often flippin maniacs. We had fishing boats fishing slap in front of the shipping lanes exits (legal but blimminek...) ships doing 20 knots with anchor lights, other ships doing u-turns n any old place. In a F7, they are also v stressed like anyone else, and go ape at each other on the vhf...

"skipper is boss" might work on a short-distance race, but can't work against the mood of experienced crew, unless you have the backup of a warship. Not that we had any mutiny or enything close, tho I think we had praps too many crew to start - my fault not theirs, as everyone was fine, just a few too many. Mind you, we used the skills and cotributuion of everyone in boatfixing etc, so mebbe, since they all had somewhere to sleep, seven was ok?

Later on though, three crew was the minimum - i felt uncomfortable not having a spare bod during fast offshore running in busy areas at night, one to drive, another to gaze fixedly at the radar.



All above not delivered from any great height - i feel i must have screwed up on the prep cos the blimmin boat broke down bigtime twice and we lost better weather windows. I spect others (specially BrendanS) will know more bout where i mucked up, your thoughts invited.
 

studgies

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Hey Matt

Pleased you are back and the boat is working fine, sounds like the adventure did not end when we left you to it but you got there! You will be pleased to hear that my car tried to come out in sympathy with Diana II the week we got back and emptied the contents of the fuel tank into the boot!!

Would have like to do the whole trip but it was not to be, Jims dad is on the mend by the way.
 

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The decisions you made were mainly based on mechanicals or weather, and these usually required making decisions to overturn planned legs. This to my mind was vastly preferable to what others may have done, with a 'crack on regardless' attitude. I can't really fault any of the choices made, though there were obviously alternatives at each decision point.

The one thing I would change with hindsight, is actually speaking on phone once per day, rather than relying on txts as much as we did. We did speak several times when the weather patterns were just too complex to summarise in txts. Also that txts are not mission critical - several txts didn't send/receive, or were delayed by up to 48hrs.

What I learnt is that forecasting for legs of several hundred nautical miles is not like forecasting cross channel or a 100miles along south coast. On these longer legs, start and finish points could be in 2 completely different weather systems, and that swell forecasts and live buoy conditions are probably more important than wind forecasts when travelling offshore long distances
 

petem

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Matt, I'm interested to know if you enjoyed it or not? Halfway through were you wishing it was over or would you have liked it to go on longer?

Was it worth bringing the boat to the UK for a year? I was sceptical but it must have been great at times.

Also what were the best and worst bits of the journey? Any scary moments?

Pete
 

Renegade_Master

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Hi Matt, just on the subject of waypoints/route on the computor, I used my computor on my journeys around the UK putting in the wayoints in advance.

This I found very usefull as I could do this say, the night before with no rush and pick the best route avoiding the hazards etc. Once underway it was nice to monitor the vessel on screen as a second check to ensure you are far enough away from that shallow sand bank, or check your ETA

I rarely had occasion to "change" the route as I went, but then it was shorter journeys in more familiar waters.

Moreover if I had to change route for whatever reason it is quite simple to erase and add new waypoints once you make the decision to alter course. Once you have done that the computor recalculates the TTG to next waypoint ETA and nm

It even recalculates your ETA if you are forced to slow down due to worsening conditions. And finally its another thing you can play with en route on a very long passage, helps pass the time
 

tcm

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Re: waypts and barcelona

axshully yep agreed, that's fair enuf - the waypoints needed inshore are far more numerous to avoid that sandbank etc etc.

I spose that on a longer trip, we simply bashed out offshore, from which we then only needed a single fairly distant target for 6+ hours at a time. The time zips by - but by watching the radar, not the blimming chartplotter.

Oh, nuther thing for you med lot - barcelona olimpico is 24hour fuel from an attendant (not a selfservice busted credit card thing) and the only one i know of in the med (any others?). Looks all dead as you approach the fuel pontoon but they are indeed there, very good service, and the reason why we went that way instead of via palma.
 

tcm

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Re: uk-med trip - good and bad bits

It was pretty special. It *may* be the case that I enjoyed (and still enjoy) it "being completed" more than i enjoyed (some of) it at the time. In other words, i didn't carry srtraight on to Greece, in the same way as er round the world yachties don't (usually) turn around immediately and go around a second time, even tho they say what a great time they had. It's a bit phew, tyhank goodness that's done. But later, you remeber all the good bits.

I think that i've got it out of my system, at least with this boat - it is specially designed for open air seagoing hols in the med, not the uk where it's a bit of an oversized flying tent.

Yep definitely good stuff bringing the boat back to uk , got loads of stuff done and some other stuff *eventuall* done over the winter. Plus refreshed ourselves with how nice channel islands, N france, w country and solent can be as well. Not sure if this can be counted as "worth" it cos as some others said, i cd've bort a boat and soldit for the money it cost. Mind you, cd've sold the boat and not done it at all, that wd be cheap too...

Worst bits are when the thing breaks. Most disheartening was when we found the long swells out of roscoff gave flatter water in depths of over 100m, so went a bit further offshore and westwards, the wind was gentle from the north, the sun shone and we were all ready to go around the outside of Ouessant across the bay - then another blimmin pipe busted just as everything flipping perfect: i was sdtill gutted about this some days later, and it meant that some crew then couldn't return to the boat. The failure before that enroute from Dartmouth, and the throttle failure at Gibraltar wasn't so critical. The crap weather at la coruna that turned us back was just one of those things, not really a "bad" moment: it was just as bad three days later but i had 12 hours daylight to play with, not just two.

Best bits include...
Magical offshore nightime scenery, with loads of stars and gradual moonrise, esp offshore portugal when the water was illuminated from the south. Bayona, very pretty but with the two marina close by almost at war with each other.
Achievement at getting into Gib on one engine, and then getting out again and into Sotogrande also on one engine and the engineer asking if we'd had a tow.
Stressed-out big-ship skippers in F7 at night in straits of Gibraltar going mental at each other "you did it again" You moved in front of me!!" etc.
Good decsion to turn north to Alicante and then barcelona's 24 hour fuel and hence make rendezvous at antibes with swmbo on the friday.
Smooth running after the rebuild when the boat at last felt as tho it had two v12's rather than a big bag of nails.
Support from shoreside types, and via text hereabouts.
Playing endless card games of Nurdle Drurdle as we waited for engineers, or for the weather.
Zefender calling/texting me to get out of the atlantic asap just as i was on the way in was a bit ooerish, but made us get a moveon. I returned the text as tho his insruction to get out of the atlantic was cos i was a stinkie, rather than cos it was abiout the weather, heehee.
Porpoise display for the last thirty miles to Barcelona, like fireworks, hubndred and hundreds of them. Seth Africans sed they had never sen so many, I sed that we brits (me anyway) imagine that all seth efricans are v cool about wildlife and probly hohum had rhino as a pet and cheetahs running round the playground at school.
Surprise from crew as they discovered that that dolt tcm can actually cook moderately acceptable food.
The south african guys 18 and 19 learning (v quickly) how to pilot the boat at night, make big adjustments, being picky about lights, and read the radar eventually so well that towards the end of the trip that they had to be fairly patient with me as i was more circumspect about what was and what wasnt a real radar "hit", especially as they could identify the lowflying french jet in thick fog as i stared a bit ooerish at radar showing 12m radius with dot coming straight at us faster than i could say er argh!
Arriving in Antibes after two years, to find almost exactly the same boats there with same skippers still being very nice but doing sod all, and we dismantled and cleaned and teaksanded and installed all the new covers in 8 hours.
Lots of other stuff.

Also, i actually like the boat a lot more than when i set out to the uk.
 
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Deleted User YDKXO

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Congrats on making it back safely, tcm. I've been following your trials and tribulations. I must say I think I would have jacked it in and thrown the keys at the nearest professional skipper I could find and told him to get on with it!
Interested to hear your comments about the seakeeping of the Leopard. I think its fair to say that most of us would think that a 23m boat, even a poncy Italian one, could plough through any seas. So how does she compare to the T48 for example? What kind of conditions made you slow down or even drop off the plane? Does a big boat like yours slam like ours do or is it a case of slowing down 'coz the crystal chandelier is swaying a bit?
How did it finish with Golden Arrow? No more costs to you I presume?
 

tcm

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lep v targa

I always feel that the journos know most about this cos hardly any of us nip on a boat, off that one on to another, back to the other, etc etc. Well, i don't anyway.

However, i do remember that a remarkable aspect of the lep when we got it was that you cvould walk about on the foredeck at planing speeds, have a dance about or just hold the anchor light and watch the waves dissappear under the bows at 20+ knots - something we'd never have tried except in superflat conditions on the targa48 and even then, a bit ooer really.

Sepretly tho, esp being a poncy italian boat, it is a bit huge in the cockpit, so instead of praps with smaller boat bashing along semiairborne whilst wedged/braced aginst everthing, this lurching lounge with large patio heaves around more deliberately which can be more alarming, or perhaps just diffrerntly alarming, esp if ploughing into head seas. After about 1,000 miles i realised that at no stage was the boat in any difficulty with the conditions - it was just me feeling a bit apprehensive about things.

I reckon that in most circumstances the boat can drive at max 20ish knots without slamming or frightening people into 20knots of wind - but it is hugely dependent upon sea state. Weirdly, this was fine in Biscay wil longer wave period but def. not ok in the med when a swell from balearix reached Cartahegna where there was only 7knots and slowed us down to non-crashing 14knots cos of the short rather than easier longer swell in the atlantic . In Gibraltar we had 25-30knots of wind on the nose and i slowed to 10knots, no idea of sea state cos it was pitch black with no moon, then the new throttles so i stopped and started it like any computery thing and erk still in gear so only one engine and er bloody heck, then swmbo rings and yakity look just get off the sodding line willya i am 600yds from rocks in f6-7 so you may have to deal with everything on yerown, ok?

The ability to handle (or not handle) the sea is a bit binary - there seems a very certain point at which the hull isn't supported over waves and the crumping turns into slamming. We had this in Biscay with Moose#1 on board, and a "sensible speed" with no crunching or crashing became 9 knots into faily hefty 2-3m swell with some waves being caught and lifted over the bow....but a turn of say 20-40 degrees off the wind, and manually (not on apilot) handling the boat through waves at 22knots became possible altho a bit lairy i have to say, continually "nipping" back towards the desired course by jumping across smaller waves and onto the back of larger ones, closing the coast for better sea state, albeit with a fair bit of rolling. Well, okay, sort of computers and cupboard contents crashing on the floor type rolling and the sort that swmbo wd defintitely not appreciate, with a relative almost fifty knots over the fordeck.

It was sortof a bit worse off finisterre, and i didn't have much option except to hide in some bays all the way down to the "turning point" and off the headlands crunch along at 12knots. I reckon that the swell there must have been 3-4 metres, ie turn even a large dinghy over at first wave no prob and most waves (or bits of waves) being caught over the bows, altho a big heavy displacement boat wd've been ok. Like a ship i spose. Ooer yes that was a bit much....then, in the middle of it, Zefender called and said "what, you haven't turned the corner yet what your fours hours from it ooh heck, oh dear, there's another suystem coming towards portugal so get the hell out of there asap..." which was a bit fritening under the circumstances of it already being failry lairy....

So it can and did plough thru some heavy stuff.

I think the assets of GA have been bought, hence the liquidators of the sod all bit left over wrote me a nice letter, to which i have just replied saying i spent loads more on remedial work, ta...
 

petem

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Re: uk-med trip - good and bad bits

Thanks Matt, good answer.

BTW how does running at night work? Do you slow down or just hope for the best? Would radar detect any submerged objects (e.g. containers)? Does the Leopard have a collision bulkhead? Night goggles perhaps?
 

tcm

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Night running

ah, well, the entire trip quickly reveals itself as a chancer's diesel-grabbing excursion. In order to catch decent weather (or swmbo hoping for a nice weekend in south of france) you often need to run day and nite. So, you need diesel first thing in the morning, 9am ish, which takes 2 hours really with slow pumps and officialdom etc etc and again later in the day, about 5ish meaning you get out at 7ish with a couple of hours daylight left. In some ports you can possibly get a tanker, which fills much faster.

As soon as you have got the later diesel fillup, you need to whizz offshore asap (eg for us from Bayona, and sotogrande, and brest) so that you are definitely 20+ miles offshore as darkness falls. Otheriwse you have to bimble offshore at lower speeds (bilbao, barcelona, vivero) and pick your way thru fishing boats etc at 10-12 knots.

Yep, you then run at 20+knots (bit much at 30knots given offshorish weather and too fast a fuel burn really) and hope there are no containers or other things - not a hope of radar picking them up and anyway you will crack holes in grp with a container whether at 12knots or 22knots. The lep has a sortof fwd headon crash bulkhead i think to the main cabin/saloon, plus two more meaningful bulkheads to the engineroom fwd and aft so if hit summink big it will hole it but there's a reasonable chance of holding flotation with big bilge pumps until dinghy/ liferaft launched. We kept passports etc in the grab bag with extra mobile vhfs and radios and cd get all the chocolate depending on how it goes, and then get off and let the boat sink - i called the insurance co to tellem we were going in so'ton and they called back to wish us well.

Running at night is often ok and praps better than daytime apart from the hitting things aspect, altho i wd guess half -sunk containers mite be hard to spot even in daylight. At nite you can see ships and then checkem visually, at least 6 miles off often more. Lights usually show at about that distance or more if a fishing boat (which has arclights for them to work) so the really bright lights are static fishy boats. Closer boats where you can see the green or red might be two miles off or less, but i tried to keep other boats 2+ miles away excpet in straits and southern spain where all a bit cramped. The flashing lights in framnce and n spain are just fishing boats with flashing lights scared of being run down, and you can see them scurrying about as you approach. In fog, more tricky cos no viz so have to keep a long way offshore as smallish boats like the flat weather. Night goggles fun but a bit pointless unless you wanted to pick up stuff close inshore, praps like arond the solent i think - i didn't feel i needed them with radar picking up stuff six miles off when i cdn't se them by eye in daylite never mind at night. I mean ooh, it's a ship that says Den Haag on the side - who cares?

Interestingly, i bet the trip is a bit (more) of a [oh really!] in a flybridge, cos a biot freezin up top but good glass-free viz, yet comfier down below but need to run up steps to check yes, that's him. With zipup camper tope we could stay warm, and unzip occassioanlly for good looksee but not risk steps on wallowing boat loaded with fuel the weight of 3 Bentleys.
 

tcm

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Re: 60 -odd foot prinny

i am sure it could, no problem at all. Or indeed a significantly smaller boat or (he says conspiratorially) a boat precisely seven feet longer than 60 feet. It would most certainly be the ultimate shakedown - any new boat would benefit from a decent long run.

I wd have better weather gear for nights on flybridge, and ear muffs all round. With highish noise levels for long oeriod i reckon an intercom thingy like on light airyplanes wd be nice for chatting to anyone else clicked into the system. Or soddit, engines on, whammo, drone, credit card, mars bars, whammo drone credit card etc etc.
 

DERF

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60 -odd foot prinny or Cranchi 34

Indeed there was an article in one of the boaty mags couple of years ago about a crew of 3 who took a Cranchi 34 by sea to Spain. took them 3 weeks..

Someone on here must have the article

Powerskip p'haps???
 

tcm

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three weeks

ah well they must've had a nice leisurely jaunt or loads of mech problems.

I have discovered that i seem a bit incapable of leisurely janut when the boat is set up with cuhions below, sleeping badgs all round etc for a delivery trip and my skinflinty nature tends towards going back out overnight if the weather is ok rather than pay to stay in the marina...
 

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Re: three weeks

Hi,
I first did it in a 46ft job, but u cant accommodate for things going wrong. First off for me from So'ton to Portugal in power in 46 ft'er.

Then, after few yrs running charter and sea school had the pleasure of the outward trip from the med to Portsmouth with Matt in 70 hours and we had a great time, albeit very serious on the actual passage /forums/images/graemlins/smirk.gif. Think thats why we found it so funny about the poor guy at the fuel pump in Cascais dresed in brilliant white that so quickly turned to a sort of diesel colour.
 

Renegade_Master

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Re: 60 -odd foot prinny or Cranchi 34

I remember that article too. As for Petem's point what about in a 60ft Fly,

Phil has done it in a Searay 54 Sedan (many breakdowns and some big seas) a brand new Manhattan 64, good weather one week to Gib daytime hours only.

And also in Fairline 50 (our ex school boat) on this occasion the owner insisted on doing no more that 10 knts off the plane all the way to save fuel tight git.
 
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Re: lep v targa

Yup, very interesting reply, tcm. Got the impression you had loads of crew on board and you did a lot of night passages. How did you arrange the night watches? Did you helm all the time (I guess not)? Did you get any sleep or were you awake for the whole trip fretting over submerged containers, unlit fishy boats and rogue waves? Indeed is it possible to sleep for any length of time on a moving powerboat?
 

tcm

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sleeping

I hadn't anticipated how good the youngster south african guys would be - from bilbao it was just me and 18yr old and 19yrold, both with some not loads of coastal saily exp. From NW tip of spain i had bout an hour sleep first nite (actually early morning) down portugal, then crash out as fuel goes in and they make food for when i get up. Next day couple of hrs in an afternoon, again after mucho drilling and grilling them bout 60 gree turns in fog etc etc , and eventually i had bout er four hours once offshore cos they seemed at least as good as me at reading the radar appropriately. On final leg from barcelona i had four hrs sleep got up, interfered with radar and then after slowing down twice for non-existent things i suggested praps they do the radar and driving and i make the bacon sarnies...

unles all equal, not easy to have strict rota, but soon enuf we did have a rota, and 2 hours is enuf. I trusted me on my own at night, not just one of them so both had to be up and working on all cylinders. I managed to orgainse my sleeping whislt well offshore and/or in good or daylight conditons eg southern portugal, ne wards toward cartaghena, in big empty bay between alicante and barclona, and middle of golfe de lion.

Sleepingwise, somewhere on the boat lurching along is the middle - the bit that you can see everything else twists around longitudinally - fwd of this goes up and down, backwards of this goes down and up. In sailyboats this is where "pipe berths" are located for kipping on the move. I reckon you need to be as close as poss to this bit, tho it changes with fuel load. If knackered tho, it doesn't matter and you def get some sleep. If skip with not super-exp types you have to stay v close to helm really otherwise they "don't like" to wake you up or may not be able to release someone to go down and get you. It's a bit droney, but you can wear earplugs, or bung rolled up bits of bogpaper in ears if no plugs.

For the record ( i know nobody asked) i didn't dare have the teeniest alcoholic drink during the shortish handed bit from bilbao, otherwise probly wd have slept far too much...
 
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