All at Sea

Saturday Aug 27



Was a foggy chilly night watch.
Very dark too, the clouds must have been very thick.
We set the lower topsails and inner jib which was fun with only three people available to do it!  I had to keep checking the lines to make sure I had the right one. That is helped because the clew lines are always on metal pins whereas the buntlines are wood. So you can count back three metal pins and know the next one you are working on the Royal.

Steering was by compass cause there was absolutely no stars visible, so no chance to try out my new found skill :-)

Slept really well, the sleeping bag was just the perfect addition to my bunk. Nice and toasty, but very hard to get out of this morning though.

Our morning watch was chilly and bumpy. The sea had a lovely cold grey colour, the colour I associate with the Atlantic, with steep sided waves. No signs of sea sickness. Which is cool given that we are a actually out at sea in the Gulf of St Lawrence heading SExE towards PEI.  Currently we are sailing under topsails, courses, t'gallants and staysails. Nice to be sailing, the smell and noise of our engine gets wearing after a while.

It was a very busy watch, had to scrub the breakfast dishes, heh.  I love bacon but cleaning up a pan full of baked on bacon grease in cold sea water is NOT fun. Also started scrubbing the ceiling of the Salon, which hasn't been done for a while. That is hard on the neck, especially since I wear tri-focals so have to tip my head back to see!

My trick on the helm was nice, sailing takes much bigger turns of the wheel to correct her course,  but there is a bigger sense of control than when motoring. I used the clouds to check for the drift of the ship's heading and it worked well. Woot.

Rumour has it we may be through the Straits of Canso either late tonight or tomorrow. The cadets from the Maritime Academy on board are hoping we go through in daylight since their whole school will come out to see us go by!

It is 1:36pm and I just got back from loling in the sun on the main hatch. it is now one of those stunningly beautiful sailing days. The waves are a dark blue with scattered intensely white horses. We are sailing with all our sails set. Even sails I never saw set on our trip. This makes all the wet, dark, heaving and hauling worth it!

The clouds along the horizon are non-threatening which is nice for a change.

Erin says the forecast is for the wind to drop around sunset so I suspect we will be back to motoring for our night watch. After we take in all these acres of canvas of course :-)

More later...


Check next post for musings on my last full sail night watch.

Here are some pictures from this beautiful sailing day.