The work on Kathryn was completed on time by Snead Boatworks and I drove a rental car from Corpus Christi to Palmento, FL arriving on Monday August 17th. I now faced the task of getting Kathryn ready for the trip back home. I had to move everything from the Pod back on the boat as well as put on the sails and test all systems. I had three days to complete these tasks before my friend Buford arrived to help me sail back to Corpus. By Friday I was ready, but very tired. The project was much more work than I had anticipated, but additional help from people at Snead Boatworks allowed me to finish on time.
 |
Buford's Story
Steve Janett and I (Buford Eddy) planned
on taking Kathryn home to Corpus Christi, Texas, from Palmetto, Florida, which
is just South of Tampa. Steve had left the boat at Snead Island Yacht Works and
they had installed new standing rigging, including chain plates, and applied
new bottom paint. Steve and I had been dock mates for years in Hammond and
Michigan City Marinas in Indiana. Steve
has brought his boat to and from Texas to Florida four times now. In the last three crossings, a combination of
factors including weather, wind and endurance, kept us from making a non-stop
crossing. The last crossing is
documented in Gulf Crossing Spring 2015 Adventure.
Friday,
August 21, 2015
I arrived at Tampa Airport around 2 PM on
the 21st of August. Steve picked me up in the rental car and took me to the
boat to unload my bags and get into some comfortable “sailing “ clothes. We then headed for the grocery store to
provision the boat for our trip. By the time we came back and stowed the provisions,
it was Happy Hour. We headed to one of our favorite Happy Hour bars called Pier
22 at the Twin Dolphins Marina across the Manatee River in Bradenton, Florida.
Our boat, Manana, had been there for an extended period and Steve had also
spent some time there. Happy hour brought back some bitter sweet feelings, but
it was great to be back on the water.
Saturday,
August 22, 2015
On Saturday morning we began doing some
last minute preparations such as attaching the Jack lines, securing the jerry
cans, and filling up the water tanks. Steve wanted to carry as much additional
fuel as possible. With the extra fuel on deck, we had about 105 gallons of
Diesel fuel. We were intent on making this a non-stop trip, even if we had to
motor all the way. Around 12:30, we
untied the lines and headed into the Manatee River. We would first go up the
river to Twin Dolphins Marina to top of the tank and fill up all the jerry
cans. I turned on the Spot at this point and sent our first OK messages. We
were off!
The forecast for the week had not been
anything to get excited about. Winds were going to start out light and variable
and stay that way for as far as they had forecasted. The wind in the River was
on our nose, so, although we had put the mainsail up, we were going to have to
motor out of the river and across Tampa Bay until we could make a turn past
Passage Key into the Gulf. The trip out
of the Manatee River and Tampa Bay took about two hours. To our surprise, once
in the Gulf the winds came at us from the North/North-East at 16 + knots. It
was the perfect conditions to set our course for 270 degrees, a direct path to
Port Aransas and Corpus Christi. We rolled out the Genoa and the stay sail and
were doing 6 and 7 knots toward our destination for the rest of the day and
into the night. The winds seem to settle down each evening and we wound up
starting the motor, usually about the time I was trying to get my three hours
of sleep, to charge the batteries and maintain a decent speed. Did I mention
the motor was about two feet from my berth? Sailing at night is beautiful. We
had about a half full moon at the beginning of the trip, and even that lit the
boat and the water up so we could see almost as much as we could during the day
in close to the boat. Each night the moon would come up earlier and set later.
By the end of the trip it was full and stayed up most of the night.
Sunday August 23, 2015
Once again the winds died in the early
morning, so we started the motor around 3 AM. Steve was ready to crash and I
took over the watch. Shortly after
sunrise the winds kicked up again and we were off on a great sail, hitting up
to 9 knots with the help of an apparent current. By 2 PM we had logged 144
Nautical miles in 24 hours! At about 27°
21 North and 85° 13 West, I spotted some spouts of water coming up about a 100
yards to the South of us. After watching two or three of them and seeing the
huge dark bodies below them, I realized it was a pod of Whales! Steve kept
saying it had to be dolphins, but I had never seen dolphins that big and I have
never seen them blow the spray of water from their blowholes like these were
doing. We watched for a while and it
wasn’t until what appeared to be the momma whale do the classic tail slap, that
Steve finally agreed they were whales. I tried to record them on our Gopro
camera, but in the wide angle mode, it was hard to see them at that
distance. We finished the day with a
dinner of Digiourno Pizza (not delivered) and a cold beer.
Monday August 24, 2015
Overnight the winds seemed to be in the
wrong direction. Normally we would motorsail if needed to maintain 5 knots,
but, despite 13 to 15 knot winds close on the bow we were only doing 3 knots or less with the motor
running at 1800 RPM. Strange! When I
came up for my 4 O’clock shift, Steve had been running South of our rhumb line
hoping to get a better angle on the wind.
He said to keep running the motor and maybe we would get a better wind
direction and an idea what was going on when sun came up. After running quite a
bit South of the rhumb line, I decided to tack back North before we got too far
off. Oddly enough, with the motor still
running at 1800 RPM, we fell below 2 Knots of speed. This was strange, because in both directions we felt like were
pushing a lot of water, and if it wasn’t for the speed over ground shown on the
chart plotter, it felt like we were doing much more. The sun had been coming up
and Steve got up to see what was going on. We motored back to the rumb line and
got back on course. Steve began looking at some current information he had
downloaded before leaving, and after he entered in our co-ordinates, it was
apparent we were in the middle of a current coming up the Gulf and beginning to
turn to the West and South. Apparently, we had been fighting this current all morning.
Steve was able to call Chris Parker on his satellite phone, and after giving
him our co-ordinates, he confirmed we were in the gulf current and gave us some
waypoints to sail towards to get out of our predicament. He had us go
southwesterly to ride the currents and then Northwest at a certain point to
ride the currents up again. The results were immediate and fantastic. The wind was on the magic beam reach that
most boats love and we were flying at and above hull speed. We probably lost half a day of travel and may
lose more time going South to get out of the current. Right around noon, we encountered a huge
cloud formation with heavy rain and thunder rumbling. Almost every night, so
far, we experienced lightening shows in the distance. Now we were approaching
systems that we could see and hear clearly right in front of us. The view was
spectacular as we could see the entire cloud and the rain pouring down and hear
the rumble of thunder. We dropped the
sails and were able to motor around the clearly defined storm. We continued on
to our two waypoints (about 150 miles) to get back on track to Corpus Christi.
At least we were heading West.
Tuesday August 25, 2015
We had been sailing all night long and
when the sun came up we were met with a cloudy sky all around, but the current was apparently still in our
favor as we sailed all that day between 6 to 8.5 knots on 13 to 16 knot winds
off the beam. There were lots of clouds all around and some that looked threatening
in the distance. We had all three sails up and had a beautiful day of sailing,
listening to music and I even played some music and sang a few songs on my
guitilali. A perfect day! We had made
our first waypoint and were heading Northwest towards our next one. Towards
late afternoon the winds kept increasing. We reefed the genoa and later the
main as the wind kept increasing, and so did the waves. The boat was still
doing 8 knots plus with 2 reefs in the main and only about 1/3rd of the genoa
out. We took the stay sail in completely because it didn’t seem to handle it
too well. We had a little bit of rain
and we brought out the foul weather gear. The jackets seemed almost too much
with the heat and activity, but we knew from previous trips that it could get
very uncomfortable and cold if we got soaked by the wind and waves. The rain stopped but the wind and waves kept
pounding us as the sun disappeared. We saw a boat with restricted
maneuverability on our AIS that was directly ahead of us. Steve hailed him on
the radio and asked him if he had any weather information. After gathering some information, he told us
that they were surveying the current we were in and that the wave action was
exaggerated by the 20 knot winds from the North fighting the 3 to 4 knot
current going into the wind. We had about 20 more miles before we were out of
that situation. This is the kind of thing that happens when a boat leaves for
the Bahamas with a North wind and they try to cross the North flowing Gulf
Stream. As we approached the survey
boat, we appeared to be on a heading to go to his starboard side, but the
current was pushing us sideways so fast, that the closer we got we had to
change course to go to his port side to avoid a collision. We continued to try
and sail, but eventually took the sails down. We rocked and rolled all night.
Wednesday August 26, 2015
Steve called Chris Parker again and he
gave us more co-ordinates to make the best of the wind and the currents to
Corpus Christi. Having access to Chris Parker with all his experience and
weather forecasting expertise was perfect. Chris Parker provides a weather
routing service to subscribers and checks in with his clients on the single
side band radio every morning around 9:30 Eastern time. Steve was having some
trouble with his SSB radio and could not seem to broadcast consistently.
Normally he would be able to join in the conversation, ask questions and even
down load weather information through his pactor modem. He had recently
re-routed his antennae and with every powerful pulse of radio waves it somehow
“took over” the autopilot, causing it to jerk back and forth and even shut down
completely. Luckily, the satellite phone provided a line of communication to
Chris and his valuable information. Chris’s course, once again, provided us
with non-stop sailing with only some light and fluky winds in the early morning
hours. At this rate, we would be in Corpus Christi by Friday afternoon. That’s
a 6 day crossing! Our fastest trip yet. Our main fuel tank was more than half
full, and we hadn’t even touched the jerry cans! We calculated that we had been
sailing for almost 80% of our trip. The few times we ran the motor to
supplement our speed was during the current problems and some light fluky winds
in the early morning. The rest of the fuel was used to run the motor to charge
the batteries as needed. We were headed due West to Port Aransas passage at 6
to 8 knots until the midnight hour calmed the winds again.
Thursday August 27, 2015
Although we had no set watch hours during
the day, we divided the night into 4 hour shifts. I took the 8 to Midnight
shift and then Steve took the Midnight to 4 AM shift when I took over
again. I liked the idea that I got to
see the sunset every night and the sunrise every morning. I was tired when I ended my 8 to midnight
shift and Steve took over Thursday morning. I got into my berth about 12:30 or
so. About 1 AM, the winds had died and Steve was trying everything to get our
sailing momentum back. I woke up to the sound of the banging and slapping of
the sails that sounded like the boat was breaking up from down below. That went
on until about 2 when Steve gave up and cranked up the motor. Although the
motor is right next to my berth, the steady roar of the motor was better than
the banging and slapping of the sails and rigging. I zoned out the noise and
finally slept until I woke up for my 4 AM watch around 3:30. Although the day
didn’t start as good as the last three days of sailing, we were soon on our
rhumb line at 6+ knots and still on track to arrive in Corpus Christi on Friday
afternoon.
When I tell people about off shore
sailing, they always ask if we are afraid being hundreds of miles from land
with nothing in sight but water in all directions. If there is one thing we
take very seriously, it is safety. We always wear our PFD’s at night, during
rough weather and when only one of us is in the cockpit. We always use tethers
and secure ourselves to the boat when we are alone on watch. We never go out on
the deck without being secured by a tether and always with the other person
above decks and watching our every move.
Although we had good weather on this sail, we normally always reef the
sails at night to avoid storms that can sneak up on you in the dark. Our other
safety equipment includes a certified survival life raft, an EPIRB that we
could activate to send out a satellite distress signal or would activate
automatically if submerged, an AIS system that identifies other ships when they
come within 20 miles or so, and identifies us to them, a high definition radar
and our Chart Plotter that combines the radar and AIS for easy viewing. For
communication we have our normal, short range VHF radio, our long range SSB
Radio, a Satellite telephone and a satellite Spot tracking device that broadcasts
our position every few minutes and allows us to send emails and texts as well
as a distress signal that would summon help from various sources. With all
that, and the 12 tons of sailboat that the wind is pushing across the sea,
there is not a whole lot to be afraid of.
Besides, to quote Bob Bitchin, the only difference between an ordeal and
an adventure is your attitude. The best thing for a great attitude is to be
sailing.
As the sun goes down, we only have about
90 miles to Port Aransas passage. The wind has died and we have furled the sails
to avoid the banging and motored into the night. By morning, the winds will
return and we will proudly sail through the passage and on to the approximate 2
hour trip to the Corpus Christi Marina. It has been “A Lovely Cruise”. Steve
requested that I play and sing that song as we finish our trip tomorrow. We
didn’t expect to get here so quickly, but we will be just in time to make it to
the Happy Hour at the Yacht Club!
August 28, 2015
After 5 days of almost perfect sailing
wind and weather, on our last day, although clear and sunny, the wind had died.
We motored the rest of the trip with minimal help from the wind, sails or
current. The closer we got to closer to Corpus, the freight and tanker traffic
started increasing and eventually turned into a “parking lot” for several miles
of anchored ships. Steve had woke up before sunrise to join me on watch. We
were approaching what appeared to be a group of oil platforms. In the dark, all
we could see were the bright lights of the “platform”. With the lack of depth
perception at night, we tried to use the radar to help us keep a one mile
safety zone from them. I kept turning to port, but every one we passed seemed
to get uncomfortably close to us, some less than ½ mile. As we tried to pass
the last one, we had turned more than 30 degrees to port and he was still to
close. By that time, the sun had started coming up and we realized the
“platforms” were a fleet of fishing boats moving toward us in formation at a
slow rate of speed while dragging their nets. The bright lights had blinded us
so much that we could not see the running lights, or anything else that would
have identified them as vessels underway. Embarrassing, but also very
dangerous. Fishing boats dragging nets or lines have the right of way and probably
would not even thought about changing course until it was too late. That was
the biggest event as we motored through the anchorage and into Aransas Pass and
into Corpus Christi.
We did get a welcoming show from some acrobatic dolphins
riding the wake of a large ship and others that swam along side of us in Corpus
Christi Bay. I played and sang “It’s Been a Lovely Cruise” at least three
times. By the time we tied up in our slip, we had traveled 960 miles in 6 days
and only used about 39 gallons of fuel. That’s a Sailing Adventure!
