Mudandam Before Front
Just over 1200 nautical miles distance to finish, sailing upwind, heading north east with 10 knots of boat speed. Squally conditions with torrential rain and big winds shifts look set to last through today, more established trade winds ahead.
The Onboard Report From Today,”Full on night again in rain clouds bringing squalls of up to 30 knots of wind and sudden wind direction changes of 60 degrees. After a great day sailing yesterday making good progress, the building clouds and occasional lightening around dusk were the advance warning signs of a long night ahead. Sure enough as the first dark cloud came over head the wind shifted and increased suddenly, we rode it out – keeping the boat headed as high upwind as we could without stopping, before the cloud had gone. Wind speed was around 19 knots really too much for a genoa we are nursing northwards with a damaged leach (the back edge of the triangular sail). Next cloud – furl (roll) the sail early, same again feather the boat upwind, there after we set the smaller solent jib that allows us to deal with higher wind speeds. Then around 2330 GMT, two and a half hours before sunrise we could see by the light of the moon an enormous cloud, furl solent, put reef in….. then wind dropped to 4 knots. We were left there without wind, the boat slamming between her two outside float hulls, and the mainsail and mast crashing back and forth. After a while (seemed like a lifetime ) we set the genoa, only just as we are about to unfurl it, the wind cranks back in and we are back to the solent jib. Though the clouds are getting fewer now, there are still a few on the horizon and just a few minutes ago – the guys on deck received another shower.
The days seem to be going quickly at the moment – a good sign, I think by the end of sunday we’ll be thinking that every second is taking an hour, but for now the fast ticking clock is with us, and there is some motivation on board to ensure we have completed everything on our round the world experience list that we can before arriving. You don’t often get the chance to sail around the world so you have got to fit everything in!!! I am not sure what exactly is left, but I don’t want to wake up a few weeks from now and think – hey, I went all the way around the world and didn’t do that!”
Musandam In The Doldrums (Photo Courtesy of Oman Sail
Mohsin Al Busaidi is set to become the first Arab to circumnavigate the globe non-stop and his accomplishment to date is already inspiring school kids to take up sailing and young Omani adults to apply for the next Race Team selection process in April.
Through the Doldrums and finally back into the Northern Hemisphere for the first time in 63 days .
Spirits are high onboard but the wind remains light, boat speed averages have been low and no significant breeze is forecast before the finish.
At 11:39:10 GMT on 17 March 2009, Musandam and crew inched across the equator and into the welcoming breeze of the Northern Hemisphere. After 68 days at sea, 63 of them spent in the Southern Hemisphere, Mohsin Al Busaidi and the rest of the crew were elated at the prospect of having no more goals to reach before crossing the finish line off Muscat. ”We are only making 7 knots of boat speed at the moment but it feels much faster after the unthinkably slow speeds of the last week. At this stage we just need to keep the boat together and continue the daily checks and get home safely. We are in the middle of the Indian Ocean, the sea is an awesome crystal clear blue colour, and very flat – it’s lovely. I asked Mohsin how happy he was to be at the equator, and he couldn’t stop smiling for a good 20 minutes – he feels like he is nearly home, and has two of the best eyes onboard – I can imagine him in a few days straining at the horizon for any hint of his home land.” Charles Darbyshire, Navigator and Communications.
Musandam In The Doldrums (Photo Courtesy of Oman Sail)
400 miles north east of the Seychelles, with the southern most islands of the Maldives over 600 miles to the east, trimaran Musandam currently situated at 02° 29.9350 S / 062° 13.0724 E. See the latest position on the Race Tracker.
Heading north west with a 5 knot wind from the north (the direction Musandam is trying to head). The hope is that they have now found a more consistent breeze and that this is the beginning of the end of the Doldrums and sanity can be restored.
Over 90% of the distance of their round the world attempt is now covered and has been done so at relative high speed, this last 10% with Muscat effectively on the radar has become a all about preserving sanity, with the cabin temperature a stifling 30 degrees and little or no shade on deck the British boys have pulled out the stiff upper lip attitude and of course have reveled slightly in the England victory over France in the 6 nations last night, some sporting banter to take all their minds off the slow progress. Mohsin again finding the conditions easier to handle in the heat but as frustrated as everyone else that they have been slowed for so many days, there will be some significant offerings to Neptune (God of the sea in Roman mythology) as they cross the equator from south to north requesting more favorable winds for the remaining 1,500 miles of their journey .
News from The Crew onboard today ”The last 12 hours have been fairly hard work…. we have changed sails, got rained on (heavily) and manage to move just 15 nautical miles. This is some kind of record, especially for this boat. We hope now to have found some slightly more consistent wind and perhaps things can improve from here on. Unfortunately that new wind is from due north, exactly where we want to go – and it’s only 5 knots, so it’s far from the keys to the exit to the doldrums we wanted. We still have quite a bit more twisting and turning to do before we are out, but the horizon is clearer now, so perhaps it’s the beginning of the end.
Apart from that we had managed to make some progress between noon and 1700 GMT, a massive 35 nautical miles. All these distances we are used to doing in two or 3 hours, in fact it’s possible to do that 15 nautical miles in 30 minutes in the right conditions so it’s quite odd to be looking at the computer distances and seeing how low they are, even the scale on the electronic charts to see our 24 hour period is a long way from it’s normal view – a good day is 400 nautical miles, a big day 500 nautical miles.
Obviously it’s still hot and only the hours of darkness really offer a respite, sun hats, sun cream and sunnies are the 3 S’s that you need before heading out on deck during daylight, then head for the 4th S is shade, and try to conserve energy by the 5th S which is sitting. Loik just woke up looked around and said “the doldrums have cost us a lot of energy”, that says it all. The miles here are the hardest fought for anywhere on the planet., we can’t rely on the efficiency of the yacht designer’s hull shape, or the sailmakers sail shapes, or the skill of the crew to steer them, or sheet them correctly. No wind means no power and just like a car with no fuel, we go nowhere.
The flip side of all of this is that we are not totally loosing our sense of humor and are lucky to have at least two stiff upper lips onboard, and generally in better spirits when Haribo time comes around. We keep reminding ourselves how ‘lucky’ we are to be here, and that there are far worse things to do, in far worse places than this. AND WE ARE NOT TOO FAR FROM ARRIVING BACK IN MUSCAT. which we are all looking forward to very much!”
Thierry and Mohsin wait for wind (Photo Courtesy of Oman Sail)
Still in light airs with slow progress and trying to get ahead of the weather system that seems to be traveling with Musandam, as they search for the transition from the Doldrums to the north east trade winds. “we do feel like we are getting there” Charlie commented this morning. At the time of the call into Oman Sail HQ winds had dropped again to 3 knots and boat speed was 4 knots, but ever optimistic he also commented that “the wind is out there, we just need to get to it”
Current forecasts continue to state that Musandam needs to continue to try and move north and north west as what little wind they can get will be what gets them out of the this slow frustrating situation.
Charlie said this from onboard Musandam today. “Although we are still in very light airs, we have managed to move a few miles, we have had two lots of 2-3 hours where progress has been reasonable. In roughly the right direction for us – north west. We need to get north west to get clear of the light airs that are holding us. For now we are in winds from around 200 (just west of south) @ 7 knots (13 km per hour), which means we are making north west course at 10 knots.
Lots of people have asked me via email the question – does it feel like a long time? In some ways the answer is yes, and others the answer is no. The finish seems quite close, even though we still have more than 1700 nautical miles sailing to go, but each sun rise is like a new day and you take each day as it comes, there are obviously routines that help break the day up and the days slip by fairly quickly. Sometimes i find myself thinking we are on a short trip and are nearly back to base and think it odd that Muscat doesn’t suddenly appear ahead of us before nightfall, and we’d be getting ready to take the mainsail down, engine on, get dock lines ready before going out to sail again the next day. Of course that doesn’t happen, night falls and we keep sailing eating sleeping just the same as the last 65 days and nights.
These quiet conditions have meant that we all sleep a lot more deeply than when we are being thrown around in waves. For the sleeper this means deeper and longer dream sleep, some interesting ones coming out when people stumble on deck after being asleep! and for those on watch trying to wake up the sleeper, it takes more than a couple of name checks to rouse the sleeping crew man. I guess this means we are catching up a bit on our sleep, but it also goes to show how lack of sleep can be a gradual thing, you don’t feel super tired, but when your head hits the pillow – you’re gone.”
(Photo Courtesy of Oman Sail)
430 miles south east of the Seychelles with the Equator 440 miles ahead, trimaran Musandam making slow progress north is currently situated at 07° 03.9435 S / 062° 05.9227 E. See latest position on the Race Tracker.
2700 miles nautical miles ahead of 80 day virtual pace boat, over 20,000 nautical miles covered since the start (8th January 2009), 1888 miles distance to finish. See full boat date on the Race Dashboard.
Hard work over night as they crew pulled out Musandam’s entire sail wardrobe to try and keep moving northwards, at times all 5 of them on deck in torrential rain “the rain was incredible, it was school geography lesson that came alive, water being sucked up from the surface of the ocean and then the rain that that process creates – but you can never imagine how much rain that could be and it’s hard to describe how much water was in the downpours, what an amazing natural phenomena” comment Charlie this morning. On the upside life was fairly pleasant onboard despite the lack of wind, the good thing was that they were moving and continue to do so and are hunting the wind down rather than waiting for it to find them.
There is a high pressure system situated to Musandam’s east and the current forecast predicts scattered clouds and showers over the next two days, the flow is due to clock during today though north west to north to north east. Winds still predicted to be light through friday and more breeze expected by Saturday
Charlie fills us in on life from onboard Musandam today “Sunrise here in the Indian Ocean, to starboard (right hand side) we have the sun coming up quickly and I am sure we’re in for a hot one today, out to our port side (left hand side) a fairly full moon still high in the sky, very nice conditions though upwind in light airs (8 knots). Last night we had some incredible cloud fun, getting stuck under a couple of massive ones with torrential rains and huge shifts and increases and decreased in wind strength. Big blasts of warm and then cold air, full on doldrums conditions. In one 3 hour period we fairly constantly changed sails, Genoa, Solent, Bare Head, Solent, Genoa, then ended up with 1 reef. All this with torrential rains, Hooch was asleep in the bunk below the cockpit floor, and had to listen to the winches turning almost constantly, going through the gears on the winch – we have 3 per winch, plus the ability to engage an over drive to give a total of 6 different gear ratios. That’s what the doldrums is all about, I am sure most people think of periods of no wind just sails flapping and going nowhere with nothing to do, but there is more work to do during the light airs than during the heavy airs just to keep the boat moving.
During the day yesterday our progress was very slow and we set the fishing line. It’s not really a normal thing to do on a record attempt, but our speed was so slow that (like the time off New Zealand) it seems crazy not to give it a go – especially as we were just by a shallow bank where we knew fish would gather. Sure enough after a while the line went tight and Mohsin was able to land a sizable fish – not quite as big as our Kiwi catch, but plenty big enough for everyone to have a good feed and second helpings. Our Kiwi catch was cut up in to steaks, where as this fish was prepared by Mohsin who efficiently (with an all too blunt knife!) gutted and filleted the fish making some good steaks for Loik to cook. It was a welcome addition to our food program today, and it was a welcome distraction to the Doldrums. Mohsin was a bit worried he might become more well known for being a fisherman than a sailor, but hopefully everyone understands how unusual it was to be fishing!!!
Generally our stores are holding up well, our pile of empty grey food bags is quite big now, we have converted their contents in to energy and white garbage bags which we store up forward for disposal on land. We only have one 5 day bag left in the back of the boat and two under the generator floor - a very graphic reminder how long we have been going. Remember no stops, no resupply, if it wasn’t onboard when we left we have done without it. We have learned a lot about what we would take next time and what we would leave behind. It’s one of the benefits of the Oman Sail project that the lessons we learn will help make future trips better, faster, more efficient, and easier to plan. Where as traditional sailing programs gather people together for the period of the challenge, afterwards everyone moves on to different projects, never really capitalizing on the collective knowledge. Keeping this line of development open over a period of years will make it possible to make well informed decisions about what works, and what doesn’t.
Now that we are back in warmer climates, the battery charging is more efficient and the watermaker makes water maybe twice the rate than in the colder waters of the Southern Ocean - this is great as it meant we could draw off a couple of buckets of fresh water to wash with, a real luxury and in the last hour of darkness I managed a bucket bath in the cockpit. It’s incredible how fresh the soap smells after so long relying on wet wipes. I think when we hit land we are going to have a sensory overload, with the sights, noises and smells of land hitting us hard. We will be ready for it and also to see some new faces other than those 4 we have been looking at onboard for the last 2 months.”
(Photo Courtesy of Oman Sail)
“The doldrums are somewhere you have to go to get to where you are going, you would only go there once just to see what it was like, but each round the world attempt has two doldrums crossings. For those chasing an existing record they can be the making or the breaking of it. For us setting up a new record time, we will always be able to say ‘ah but we had the doldrums bad on the way back, that’s what it feels like now, that we have the doldrums bad. In reality this is what the doldrums is, to have it bad we would have to be here for a week and we have only had it for 14 hours or so. Such is the quick changing of the pace that yesterdays fair to good predictions have become a tough crossing. Right now, an hour after dawn has broken there is a landscape of rain clouds around us for 270 degrees, these mainly are sucking up wind and leave very little behind making for huge light patches and rain. The good news if there is any is that the remaining 90 degrees of clearer sky is broadly ahead of us. So heading north will eventually take us into new breeze from the north west and we will be on our way. Just an hour into the calms yesterday we did have a light north west wind and although we knew that it would not be the wind we were waiting for, it was at least something to hope for! Sure enough it changed a few minutes later and normal service was resumed.
From Onboard Musandam Today “Day 61 of our food bags is back to warm weather food, as the food is based on the 80 day pace boat (she is still coming out of the south) we are well ahead of schedule, but have decided to stick to the days as they come, but it does mean that today we get slightly smaller meals (less kcal) and some light weather breakfast things, like Krisproll dried bread rolls are back on the menu and tomorrow everyone’s favorite snack makes a reappearance, Biltong, dried meat, great to chew on, great to add to now familiar tasting freeze dried food, also a new bag of Alpen cereal. Hooch has a new recipe for making that his number one breakfast, alpen, hot water and powdered milk.
After the previous night’s flying fish, Mohsin used the light airs to drop the fishing lure into the sea – nothing, we believe our lure only works on Kiwi fish. There have been a few sea birds passing us by, but apart from that no other sea life for a while. Loik and I were remembering the doldrums near to Singapore and agreed they were much the same (both Loik and Charlie were onboard Musandam when she was B&Q/ Castorama for the Asian record circuit established between March and May 2006), however here there are no fishing boats, where as in Asia there was more than you could count. I guess as we close on Muscat we’ll see more life at sea, we have seen a couple of container ships, but that has been it.
650 miles north west of the Seychelles with the Chagos Archipelago 570 miles to the north east, trimaran Musandam currently situated at 12° 45.6799 S / 062° 23.4017 E. See latest position on the Race Tracker.
Just under 3000 nautical miles ahead of 80 day virtual pace boat – a good advantage as the pace boat keeps moving at just over 280 miles per day relentlessly, no windless zones, no bad sea state it just keeps going.”
(Photo Courtesy of Oman Sail)
900 miles south of the Reunion Islands trimaran Musandam currently situated at 35° 07.4572 S / 057° 54.4294 E E. See latest position on the Race Tracker
Making steady progress directly north in a 20 knot south easterly wind, sunny dry conditions on deck have transformed life in the last 24 hours
What a difference a day makes, life onboard Musandam has been restored to comfortable and importantly (especially for Mohsin) they are heading north towards Muscat. The only cause for concern right now is a low pressure system situated south of Madagascar, they need to try an avoid getting forced to far west and being effected by the strong winds that will come with it and more uncomfortable upwind sailing, the low will move south by tomorrow (Saturday). Currently expecting to pass around 250 miles east of the Reunion Islands, then next on the radar will be the passage through the doldrums currently situated at 10-12 degrees south.
“It’s friday again, the past few weeks have really gone so quickly, we find ourselves coming in to the last weeks of the trip so soon. The last 24 hours has been one of change, we started out still with rough sea 3 reefs in the main and staysail and we have ended up with full mainsail and solent jib. It’s dry on deck, we are heading exactly where we want to go and making ground to the north very quickly, as we left the 40′s yesterday we saw a couple of flying fish, they seem to be a long way south, but a sign things are warmer already. Being dry on deck is a novelty again and Loik just came off a long stint on deck totally dry and without having to wear a foul weather jacket!!!! everyone’s mood is reflected in the change of weather.
The real end to the south for us was probably a long line of cloud that was the front that brought the change of wind and wave conditions. We had seen it on the satellite pictures, we could see it for 5 hours before sailing out from underneath it. one minute 18 knots then the next 3 knots, the sea changed instantly too -unreal….. a hue line of cloud, a big rolled edge to it stretching as far as the eye could see in each direction. After 2 hours of shifty and variable ( 3-19 knots of wind) we were away to the north east making progress to our routing waypoints and a general feeling of a line being drawn between two parts of the journey.
Have a look on the chart of Cochin in India, this is where the Volvo Ocean race visited and their experience of getting there varied greatly – one boat only managing 48 nautical miles in a 24 hour period, so ETA predictions change very quickly. The greatest challenge of modern offshore racing is that the boats have such great variation in speed. So a small increase (or decrease) or even a 10 degree shift in the wind direction will add (or reduce) many knots of boat speed – added to that a large sea state factor where we must also protect the boat and ourselves from traveling too quickly over too rough a sea.
It’s as frustrating for you spectators as it is for us onboard NOT knowing when we will finish exactly, but that’s meant to be part of the fun! This is a natural driven sport and that means we have to live with the variety that nature is going to give us!!!”
(Photo Courtesy of Oman Sail)
After a bumpy and uncomfortable 24 hours conditions are now significantly better sailing downwind rather than almost upwind, winds are still strong and Musandam is still moving fast towards the Cape of Good Hope. Lighter winds ahead and expected for the next few days as they negotiate a small high pressure system situated south of South Africa, a more problematic high pressure may block their path in around 4 days time and negotiating the Argulhas current (see more information below) can have some bearing on the decision for the transition from the South Atlantic Ocean and back into the Indian Ocean
We slipped past the Meridian about 0310 GMT, of course it was dark and with out ceremony, or celebration, we just keep going east. After yesterday’s experiences of zero gravity things have calmed down a bit, the wind is still as strong as it was but we are downwind rather than nearly upwind, so motion onboard is significantly improved. As a final send off from the violent motion I was treated to whacking my knee against the (very solid) carbon fibre cabin door. Mohsin had woken us up (I was going on deck to keep Thierry and his thumb dry) and we were on the way when we heard a bit of commotion on deck, usually this isn’t anything to be worried about, especially as often you have a 6th sense about these things, but none the less Mohsin appeared in the hatch saying come quick…. so I pulled up my wet weather trousers, thew on just a light jacket and made a turn (ill timed as it turns out) to run on deck to see what i could do to help… as I turned the boat jolted and I kneed the door harder than you would your worst enemy….Ouch!!! any way we get on deck…. as i got to the main hatch Loik was there all calm saying there was a mistake. Unfortunately Mohsin’s ears, buried beneath hat and hood, had heard Loik say “go get the others” where as what Loik actually said was “take off your gloves to come and help”. it’s such an easy mistake to make – especially with the wind howling like it was and going upwind there is so much wind and water across the deck, other bumps bangs and squeaks, that we often turn to one another and ask what they just said – only to get a shaking head and “wasn’t me” in response.
Thierry’s scuffed up his thumb the other day whilst going up the rig, it’s required a few bandages and importantly to be kept dry – very difficult in these conditions. He manage 24 hours below before getting back on deck, he could not resist it. His thumb will mend fully, and will be way better in a few days if only we can keep it dry – managing well so far.
With Thierry back on deck and me not having slept a bit due to my zero gravity experiences, Loik and he gave me a bit of a lie in… which was nice, still managed to do last minute video conference with Sunset & Vine/APP in Oxford, run the generator, collect the weather, sort the food and so on….. but also managed some good sleep too – we still have another 12 hours or so of fairly strong conditions so it’s good to put some sleep in the bank.
Looking slightly further ahead the conditions look mixed, south east of South Africa will be sitting a large high pressure which we must either sail upwind to the north of or get south – but it’s huge, so will be hard to get to the south of it.. we will just have to see how that moves the next few days and hope it can move in our favour, else we are in for a fair bit of up wind hard work again.. with the associated side effects.”
