Thursday 16.08.2018
We are well on our way south and is heading for Baly Bay, just north of Cap Andre,
where we will prepare New Dawn and wait for the weather window to cross the Mozambique
Channel, which is a crossing to be taken seriously and with caution. There are still
a few anchorages to be visited on the way, including one where we hopefully can do
the last provisioning, as it will be the last chance before we get to South Africa.
Two days ago as we were closed hauled on a fresh west wind, all of a sudden – within
a second – the wind changed to east and increased in strength to a Gale (BF 8) at
32 kn. The waves build up surprisingly quickly and I had to reef both sails and we
tacked many times to get into shelter (Harry now knows how to tack). The anchorage
at the town of Analava looked too exposed to this wind, so I opted sail a bit up in
the river next to the town and dropped anchor there on the north shore, quite close
to the mangroves. It continued to haul with winds of up to 34 kn and the strong current
was swinging us around a lot.
These katabatic winds are apparently caused by a high system (1024 Hp) to the east
of Madagascar and according to the forecast, this high should remain in place for
eight days. Thus, we are hibernating and will wait the wind to change to south
and moderate a bit before we can sail further south.
Wednesday 22.08.2018 (Day 1).
In the end we stayed three days before we ventured out of the river and tried to
stop In Katsepe to do the last provisioning. However when we arrived the wind was
hauling and it would be impossible to anchor safely, so we turned around and continued
sailing south and eventually arrived in Baly Bay, with a night stop along the way.
Baly Bay turned out to be problematic to anchor in and I could not launch the tender
as the wind and waves were to high. Also as it is shallow along the side, we were 1-2 NM
away from the town, so we stayed on board.
We finally left Baly Bay this morning at 06:40 and I had spend most of the night
checking the weather forecasts, as there seems to be a weather window opening up
for us until Tuesday 28.08 and although it looks very tight, I hope we can get to
the anchorage at Bazaruto in Mozambique by the Monday PM 27.08 at the latest. The
forecast is not ideal as it shows some light variable winds for several days, but
if I wait, we might have to wait about ten days for the next window. We have to
cover 725 NM to the anchorage, i.e. we have 5.5 days to get there, or 132 NM/24 h,
or an average speed of +- 6.5 kn/h. Usually I sail an average of 6.5 kn/h, or
154 NM/24 h, but here there are strong currents and a difficult weather pattern.
As I write this we have only sailed 51 NM since leaving this morning and we have
sailed 12 h, so we are below the required average and an increase will be needed
for us to get to Bazaruto before the strong wind is expected. So I am in racing
mode. Unfortunately the forecast was incorrect and instead of bringing SE 10,
we have WSW (235°) 10 i.e. “on the nose”. We are now tacking to get passed Cap Andre,
which was not expected. Cap Andre is the point sticking out on the west coast of
Madagascar and is notorious for its bad weather and difficult currents that comes
from the south and the north, giving troubled waves. This is less than good and I
hope the wind direction will soon be more favourable for us.
Harry cooked again a very nice meal and used cooking cream for the Hakkebof with
some of the green Madagascar peppers I bought in Crater Bay.
The other day when we were having dinner in the cockpit, right next to us was
a whale breathing. From the sound of it I guess it must have been a big one. As
it was dark we could not see it, but only hear it breathing. On our way south we
have spotted several whales at a distance, blowing the fountain. It reminds me
of when I was sailing from Panama to the Marquises, where almost each day we had
these big whales swimming right next to us and some followed us for 20 minutes.
One even swam just in front of us at the bow, which I filmed and put about 20
videos on YouTube in 2014 called “whales in Panama”. At 22:10 I heard a soft bang
on the front of the boat and something touched the SB (star board) side all along
the boat, which sounded coming from fins flapping along the side. We believe we had
hit a sleeping whale and it must have gotten a chock to be awaken so brutally by
us. Poor thing, but as it was dark, we could not see it but just hear is scraping
along the boat. This is a first for me and I am glad we suffered no damage and hope
the whale will be OK. Madagascar and all this area down to South Africa, is well
know for loads of whales.
Thursday 23.08.2018 (Day 2).
The wind dropped around midnight and I had to start the engine. Our watch system
is that we each take six hours during the daytime and three hours during the
nights. I turned off the engine at 07:00 as the wind had picked up a bit from
the ENE at 7 kn and increased to 13 kn during the early morning. The boat speed
was up to 6.5-7 kn, but it is frustrating only to have a SOG (Speed Over Ground)
of 4.5-5 kn as there is a counter current of about 2 kn.
The sunrise was magnificent although cloudy at first. Have, so far, only spotted
a Tanker of 333 m long heading for India and it had a draft of 21.6 m.
Friday 24.08.2018 (Day 3).
The wind continues to be variable (little wind from several different directions)
and we still have the counter current most of the time.
My second night watch starts at 00:00 and we are still on engine with only a couple
of kn wind from the NNE. We start to see commercial ships on the AIS and even ships
at a distance of 96 NM away – amazing this AIS (Automatic Identification System). I
am surprised to see we have a current running in 157° direction. Surprised because
the Mozambique current should be situated about 46 NM to our WSW. We are at 01:46 ST
(Ships Time) at 16°13.8 S; 041° 44.8 E. I look forwards to reach the Current, but
as I am not yet sure, I will resist turning south until we reach the current. I am
sure the current will be there waiting for us.
We are running late, because of the light winds since Baly Bay, and the strong SW
wind is still expected to arrive to arrive Bazaruto Island on Monday 27.08 after
15:00 and we must be at the island by hopefully 12:00. It will be very dangerous
in the 2-4 kn south running current with a southerly wind of 20-35+ kn, as this
can cause waves of up to 20 m. I don’t want to get that experience. We still have
over 500 NM to the island. The calculation is therefore, as I write this at
02:00: 82 h and 500 NM to go equals an average speed of 6.1 kn, or 146 NM/24 h.
To achieve this we will need more favourable winds and the help from the current.
It is not impossible, but it is very tight.
Although the wind is likely to become variable this might be possible as long as
I will be able to find the best current strength and direction. But it will still
be tight to get to the island in time for the blow on Monday. So far the average
SOG has been 5.5 kn, or 132 NM/24 h, which is below my usual performance and what
is needed for this trip. However early this morning I started to see the south
running current (155°) of 2.6 kn at 16° 10 S; 41° 53 E, which was earlier than
I expected and at 06:00 when I started my watch, we had 4.6 kn running at 155° (SSE)
and the wind freshened to 9 kn from the SE. I stopped the engine and rolled out the
sails. Wonderful and immediately the SOG increased to 8.5-10 kn. Now we are sailing
again. By 07:30 we had 17 kn SE wind and the current on starboard 4.9 kn. Best speed
so far was 13.4 kn. But the the wind dropped and the SOG was only 6.8 kn. My
calculation is still to arrive Monday before 12:00, but we still have to
sail 461 NM in 77 h or an average of 6 kn/h, or 144 NM/24 h.
As we had to rush to get going from Baly Bay to take the advantage of the five
days weather window, I could not use my reserve top-up for the phone and Internet. I
had almost 100.000 MAR left, so I emailed S/Y Refalo the details and how to use
the top-up. Hope they can use the credit and at least some of my left over credit
can be used. PS: Refalo emailed me on 27.08 and followed my instructions and have
now a good amount of Internet credit left.
At the moment we have 392 NM to Bazaruto island and will need the push from the
current to be able to arrive in time, but it is still very tight, as the blow is
still expected to arrive Monday early PM. We have the coast of Mozambique 60 NM to SB.
At 12:00 I have almost finished my watch and this morning have seen everything from
18 kn to 7 kn wind and current of 2.2-5 kn in our favour, but also 1.2 kn against us.
The latter was not expected as we should have been in the constant south running
current, so I don’t understand that we now have a NE running current. This is a
strange place to sail and not easy to see the pattern, so far at least. I guess
the current will change again in our favour.
This PM, I was called on the VHF CH 16 by a Canadian captain of a fishing boat. He
wanted to chat and to know whom we are, from where and where we would be sailing
next. Very friendly chap and they were preparing 1.5 km long lines, each with 1.300
hooks on which they put Squids as bait to attract Tuna fish. They set out the lines
after 16:00 and take them in at sunrise, if I understood correctly. He lives in
Mauritius. As we had the counter current, he downloaded from his satellite system
the latest forecast and told me where the Mozambique current could be expected and
gave me some suggestions as to WP’s which I plotted into my navigation system and
we will be heading for these WP’s which here at 19:00 Ships Time (ST) is 50 NM to
the SW. Let's hope I can find that current back.
It starts to get cooler and some nights I use a light blue blanket. For the night
watches we wear long pants and a light jumpers. We have to get used to the cooler
temperatures, as it will get even cooler the further south we get.
Almost no wind since 20:00 and the little wind we received came from NNE, i.e. right
aft and only 2-7 kn, which is not of much use, so we have run the engine since
yesterday mid morning. I had not expected to use the engine that much and start
to wonder if we will have enough diesel for the rest of the trip to South Africa.
At present we have 870 l left in the tanks from the 1.200 l we carried since leaving
Hell-Ville.
Harry likes to cook and he cooked today one of the fish we caught in the Chagos. I
think this is the last fish left in the freezer and that we got in Chagos. We have
a lure out most days, but so far no luck. The Canadian captain told me that there
were not a lot of fish in this area, so perhaps that is why we have not yet caught
any fish. He told me that my white and red plastic Squid lure was a good one. Let’s
hope for more luck.
The Vang broke again last night with two loud bangs and I fixed it again this
morning after sunrise. I am looking forward to get it repaired in South Africa, and
there will be numerous other jobs to attend to. After all, when arriving in South
Africa, I will have been sailing almost 7.000 NM since leaving SE Asia seven months
before and the sailing conditions in the Indian Ocean are demanding on both the boat
and the crew, especially south of the Equator.
Saturday 25.08.2018 (Day 4).
Again we have had a bit of everything, with some very pleasant sailing, but also
some rather rough sailing coming across the Channel. So far we have sailed 425 NM
in three days and have another 300 NM to the island. The race is still on and to
arrive on Monday 27.08 by early PM. Our daily mileage are, so far, 113, 151 and
156. We will need to sail 150 NM/24 h to arrive in time and it seems possible.
Monday 27.08.2018 (Day 5).
The heavy weather should reach the island end PM today and we must find shelter
before. These heavy weather seems to run along the South Africa E coast and from
SE/S/SW and are spaced apart with 2-5 days. We will therefore have to make the
trip south in small hops and follow the barometer closely and the forecast all
the time to get the best timing and seek shelter before the next system arrives.
It is very complicated and risky. This is probably the worth area to sail on a
circumnavigation and the problem is the Mozambique and Agulhas strong currents.
The south winds blowing against the currents give regularly 10-20 m steep waves
that can break up even big ships. To add to this, there are only limited places
we can hide at.
Unfortunately the generator broke again. As I was running the water maker the
main fuse blew twice. This has happened before, after the AC power plant was
re-wired in Phuket. That mechanic took 6.5 weeks to do a job I was quoted should
take 3-4 days and when he finally re-installed it, I understood ha had not a clue
how to install it. Apparently he had lost the photos on his smartphone and did
not understand the Westerbeke technical drawings I gave him, but I also supplied
him with my photos showing how the initial wiring was done. However, cutting a
long story short, the connections and wiring are not done correctly and the generator
is not running well with wrong voltage and Hz. Knut spend a lot of time trying to
fix it, but could only do part of the job. Westerbeke in the USA, AUS. and NL have
concluded that I will need a new, or reconditioned, AC power plant, but they can’t
tell me if and when one is available and what the cost will be. Also I have yet to
find out if they have a qualified agent in South Africa. More work....
So we are running the engine to make progress and as at this moment (at 00:35) we
have only 49 NM to go to the anchorage, i.e. we should arrive around 06:00 at
the north point of the island. This is too early to start to negotiate the narrow
channels between the sand banks as we need low water to see the banks better and
we have 12 NM to get to the anchorage on the west coast . Thus, either I slow down
the boat or we anchor on the north coast and wait for the low tide at 11:30 to
start the last bit of this leg. As the wind picked up and the waves increased
to 2 m, it became impossible to anchor, so we hove to.
As of 01:30 I had stopped the engine and rolled out the Genoa. We had only 6.5 kn
NE wind and 1.6 kn current running SSE, but the SOG dropped to 4.4 kn which I hoped
would be sufficient to delay our arrival at the northern tip of the island, so we
could start to negotiate the sand bars and channels on the rising tide. I prefer
to do the last 12 NM on a rising tide, so we can see better the banks and in case
we would hit a bank, the tide would, hopefully, lift us up to get free again; at
least that is the theory/plan.
There is a surprising number of people living along the beach and they have their
huts up in the sand dunes. They are fishing all the time and I wonder how they
live and make their living? Do they have fresh water? I guess they have wells. What
do they live on. Mozambique is another of the world's most poor country. I believe
the 10 poorest countries are located in Africa, and Madagascar (no 8 on the list) and
Mozambique are thus amongst them. They have no power here and by sunset things slows
down and no lights can be seen. Welcome to Africa.
By 02:00 I slowed down even more as we are too fast at the moment, but to my
surprise, when we arrived at the 22 m depth we received 22 kn NNE wind, so I
rolled in almost all the sails as we were going way too fast.
Once at the north point of the island we were met with loads of whales that were
jumping and turning before making a big splash and making a great show for our
arrival in Africa. They were everywhere and some very close to us. From the inside
of the boat we could hear them signing and some had a higher pitch voice and I
guess that was from the calf. They were huge and as I have seen in Niue, especially
the young ones were very active in jumping out, turn to the right and make a big
splash. What a pleasant show they gave us. Thanks to the whales for the nice welcome
to Africa.
By 07:00 I had to almost hove to as low water would be 11:30 ST. In any case I was
happy that I had done my home work before arriving and we managed well the last NM
slalom and anchored in 7 m sand with good holding in front of the beach – well all
these islands are made of sand.
Mozambique.
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