Voyage Resumed

I left Sharon at Lisbon Airport on Thursday afternoon and headed back to Vigo via the Metro and then rail. A few nervous moments queing for a metro ticket at the Airport but I made the train with 15 minutes to spare. Got back to the boat about 2230 that night and Tony had cooked dinner which was very welcome.

Friday we went shopping and I treked to the Laundry.

During tea in bed this morning Tony used the loo, then I heard a splash and "oh dear" from Tony. "What's up?" I enquired nervously. Silence at first then, "well without going into details, your jacket is going to need a good hose down."

We cast off at 1100 this morning in the sun and a light breeze from the SW, bound for Biaona just a few miles down the coast and where Tony had called in on his last ocean passage 40 years ago en route for the Canaries.

We were so taken up with the wind vane that we missed the short route to Biaona and had to go the long way around the off-lying Islands

We played with the wind vane during the short passage and whilst we're not yet 100% satisfied that it is working as it should it was able to hold a course pretty well so we are fairly pleased. There are further adjustments with weights and the positioning of blocks and the tiller fitting that we can try tomorrow.

Biaona is pleasant with a most impressive, if somewhat imposing yacht club. The only one in Spain apparently to challenge for the Americas Cup (no information provided about the success or otherwise of the challenge. The Pilot states laconically that visitors are made welcome "provided the adopt the members dress code"! No details of the dress code were provided!

Anyway suffice to say that we were made very welcome without resorting to dressing up and went for a beer in the club over looking the marina and bay.

The down side of Baiona (so far) is the marina price. It's mid season at present which for our 10 meters will cost us E21.53! We'll be moving on tomorrow! Probably to "Viano do Costelo", about 30 miles down the coast. The winds are still light , not good for a long haul.

There will now be a short intermission...

Well two weeks worth actually. Tomorrow morning Tony and I get the train to Lisbon via Porto to Rendezvous with Sharon and Sue. Tony returns on the 2nd and me on the 7th May.

Sea trials abandoned today due to the rain. Will have to await our return.

That Major Job - Part 2

Well, the rain did stop after a while and whilst Tony cooked a marvellous and very authentic Spanish pork stew, I was able to re-assemble the furling gear. The instructions that came with it stressed the importance of not having the halyard too tight so when I re-hoisted the sail I ensured it was slackened off. It then furled without jamming. I think that too much tension was preventing the swivel at the head of the sail from moving freely. Not a stringent test given we were sitting in the marina with little wind but it was jamming earlier under the same conditions previously, so I am hopeful that we have now resolved the issue. Sea trials will of course be the proof of that and hopefully we will get a good result on that as well as the wind vane. Fingers crossed that the weather will be good enough for us to want to take the boat out tomorrow to test things out.

That major job.....

.... turned out to be a bit more major than we hoped.

To start with we had a lazy morning not really getting going until 1130 local time. My first job was to go off hunting for fuses, plywood (for another spare vane) and lead flashing to replace the nuts and washers I used to increase the counterbalance weight of the wind vane. Two hours and lots of hills later I arrived back with the fuses. Fortunately the plywood and lead flashing were not essential items.

Them it was time for lunch after which we started on the Genoa furling. After an initial inspection we decided to take the swivel apart (the top of the sail is attached to it so it can be hoisted up the wire stay at the front of the boat and it allows the sail to be furled round it when the right bit of string is pulled.

A couple of loose screws later and there were ball bearings running around the deck and into the water!

That meant we had to dismantle the whole furling mechanism to get the swivel off and replace the ball bearings - fortunately I had some spares. We got that done and started to re-assemble the mechanism when rain stopped play.

That gave me the opportunity to look at the laptop charging issue. Another blown fuse - now replaced and now writing this waiting for the rain to stop.

Also an opportunity to show you how quickly the Spanish can build a block of flats. Last night when we went to bed there was nothing there, this morning......

The Spanish also like their street art...

Really want to get the furling issue sorted out so that we can test the wind vane tomorrow, but it's still raining!

Vigo, Tiller Pilot, Genoa and Wind Vanne

NB all references to "Today" "Yesterday" are a day behind on account of laptop charging going on blink.

We arrived yesterday evening after a good sail from Morus.The day started out grey and wet indeed as Tony said, it made one nostalgic for the Channel.

We also started with the two hours of motoring to clear the coast in light but increasing winds on the nose. However, after a couple of hours we were able to turn south and set sail. A couple more hours and the sun came out and we had a most enjoyable sail to the Ria de Vigo and then up the Ria to Vigo itself.

The passages was just short of 46 nautical miles which I was able to measure because the log mysteriously started working again. We had a close encounter at the entrance to the Ria...

We think it was a car transporter and it was on it's way to Zeebrugge.

On arrival at about 1800 BST we were given a berth bin the old Real Club Nautico Marina about which we had read mixed reports. We apparently had use of the swimming pool, showers and Sauna a couple of minutes away. The showers were tepid but welcome and we have not tried the sauna yet.

Today we were moved into the new marina which is very posh but so new that there is no water or power yet available.

Last night we had a telephone conversation with Chris who built the wind vane and he suggested a number of areas to look at including increasing the weight of the counterbalance weight. We did that today and the results were most promising but we will have to undertake sea trial to be sure. We might therefore take the boat out for the day on Saturday to test things out.

Not so good news about the Tiller Pilot. To our great surprise the marina people said they would arrange for someone to  visit the boat. David turned up in the afternoon and the results of my careless approach to fuse replacements were revealed a burned out motor and a damaged circuit board. David took it away to investigate further and to price the repairs, but it will probably cost just as much as a new one. There's not much else to it other than the motor and circuit board! Worst news was to come though. He said it wasn't powerful enough for the boat. OK for motoring but not up to withstanding the forces of sailing!!! No pressure Wind Vane.

It turns out that we still have problems with the furling mechanism of the Genoa and after fiddling about about with it today we concluded that we'll have to take the whole system apart to investigate. That's tomorrow's major job.

Camarinas photso, First Anchorage - Ria de Morus

From yesterday's downhill sailing..

Some shots from Camarinas..

The below is a dog!

Departure this morning...

Finisterre...

It was an almost windless for the whole trip including rounding the Cape.

We left at 0645 BST and dropped our hook here in Morus at 1545. Had a problem with the Genoa on our approach. First it would not furl, then when tried to drop it to get round that problem but  it would not drop either. Finally after much persuasion we maneged to furl it enough to anchor. I then went up the mast to investigate and found a lose screw near the top of the foil (the tube that the sail is wrapped around when it's furled) which was stopping the sail from sliding down the foil. Back on deck we still had the problem with the furling but I eventually spotted that the haliyard was getting wrapped round the foil at the top and realised that this was due to an earlier incident days before on crossing to Coruna when in the blow, the whole furling mechanism got out of control and span around the stay causing the haliyard to wrap itself around it.

A local craft..

No opportunity for furtyher fiddling with the wind vane today, but we had no success with it yesterday and so it's looking rather doubful. I'm now considering getting the Aries shipped out from home. It's heavy which is why I removed it, but at least I know it works.

Tomorrow we head for Vigo, only a short hop down the coast.

WhatsApp Conversation with son re Tiller Pilot

Son = So what happened to the electronic thing?

Father = Well it blew a fuse. I didn't have a replacement so shoved a bit of metal in and because no fuse to blow it must have burnt something out internally. My fault on that count and probably putting too much strain via having mainsail sheeted in too much = too much force on machine = blow fuse or on this case meltdown!!! Pretty bloody stupid of me really but in middle of night in wind and rain just wanted to get it going so didn't think through consequences. Mick was appalled at my stupidity!

Son = Not gonna lie dad that's very stupid. You could have started a fire on your boat