Monday, June 4, 2012

6/4/12

Noon Position: 30 11' S, 130 00' W, SOG 5, COG 075, Day's Run 115nm.
An Unpleasant night - by 10:45 or so I was bashing upwind with a triple
reefed main and partial genoa, which is not in any way, shape, or form
an appropriate upwind sail when rolled that much. Every time we dropped
off a wave a little video clip from the america's cup a few years back
ran through my head, of Team New Zealand launching off a big wave upwind
and crashing down hard in a plume of bow spray, and instead of stopping
it's plunge like the hull, the mast kept going, crumpling (in slow-mo)
over the side. The electronics holocaust also continued last night, as
I was awakened in the wee hours by an obnoxious beep, and hurtled out of
bed, my still sleep-fogged mind thinking that the AIS alarm was warning
me of some nearby ship - nope. Despite being turned off, the inverter
was beeping like a dying animal, and when I tried turning it on, only
beeped louder, accompanied by blinking error codes on the little display
and horrible grinding noises from the fan. I put the spare in this
morning, so at least I still have power - the inverter survived all
sorts of abuse in the southern ocean, only to finally die a horrible
beeping death in relatively mild conditions.

No comments:

Post a Comment