Wednesday 18 September 2013
Back at Beachfront anchorage, Luganville
In signing off last night there was every expectation that the bottom of Santo would be rounded in choppy but pleasant conditions under a bright moon and we’d be arriving at our old Luganville anchorage around 5:00am.
I must say I was sound asleep in my nice little snug bunk when Cathy came down to say that a tropical storm was approaching. They’d seen it on the radar and apart from that, the sky was alive with lightening. The wind was starting to pickup and rain was falling.
It was around 3:00am and the conditions just seemed to go from bad to worse, with the intensity of the rain and the speed of the wind making the dropping of the mainsail a real test. The noise even got Gibson up to see what was happening … to which Cathy reassuringly said, … ”it’s just a bit of a passing storm, no need to worry”, or something like that.
Fortunately, the storm did pass and our approach to the Segond Channel from the south continued with heavy reliance on the [wonderful] chart plotter.but a regular update of our position on the paper chart in case the lightening got a bit too close and fried our electrics.
The anchor was finally dropped around 6:30am and pretty soon everyone was asleep.
It is here that we said farewell to Bob and Gibson and after a few hours we were ready to untie the small dinghy and zip them ashore.
For the rest of the day it’s been a case sleeping, cleaning, sorting, eating and fixing. At one point we nearly got ashore to go to town, but decided to wait until tomorrow.
A lot of time was spent sending photos back to be loaded onto the website, with our current plan being to start heading further south on Friday morning in a zig zag fashion to reduce the risk of heading straight into the SE wind.
We’ve mad a list of things to do tomorrow and it might even include buying pamplemoose (local grapefruit) at the market on account of finally running out
Smooth seas, fair breeze and my how the weather can change
Rob Latimer
As a non-sailor, I’m not sure which would be worse, the storm you went through or the direct overland route shown on the SPOT map. I’m glad you got safely to port. blessings Liz
As a non-sailor, I’m not sure which would be worse, the storm you went through or the direct overland route shown on the SPOT map. I’m glad you got safely to port. blessings Liz
Sounds like there’s never a dull moment. But that’s the fun of sailing. My google search tells me that 40,000 US military folk were stationed in Luganville during the war! No doubt most of the war scars are long gone. Have fun guys; regards to Cathy. Cheers Colin
Colin commented on Medical Sailing Ministries:
Sounds like there’s never a dull moment. But that’s the fun of sailing.Read More…