Portugal here we come

August 18^th

We departed St. Peter Port, Guernsey at 3:25pm, and are heading out to Lisbon, Portugal. We will end up mooring in Cascais, a nice marina near Lisbon. We carried out a deck check to make sure everything is secure as we will eventually cross the Bay of Biscay and don’t want anything to break on the voyage!

This Bay could give us some rough passage making. We got a bit of rain, and mainly motored as initially we had very little wind that was blowing in the opposite direction to the way we needed to go. We started our shifts of 3 hours on, 4.5 hours this time. Oh what joy!

August 19^th

Same day as yesterday except that we are now entering the famed  Bay of Biscay, and sailing over the Abyssal Plain which is over 4,800 feet deep (not that it matters much to us really, as we are not going down for a swim anytime soon).  We witnessed a beautiful sunrise, later followed by numerous pods of dolphins who would spot us and make a bee line to us, leaping in joy with perfect synchronicity. They would come across our bow and then dart quickly underneath Josie Maria, come along our side and take a quick peek or two as they follow along, until another pod would spot us and do the same thing.  It was magical!! This pretty much kept on happening for most of the day. The water was very clear and John took some good photos.

August 20^th

We started the day rather well, with good 20Kts of wind and good beam reach sailing across the Bay of Biscay. Hey, its not as bad as some have made it out to be. But things could always change. We got buzzed by a twin-engine prop plane that flew probably a few hundred metres above us. I guess the pilot wanted to take a look at us. No markings so not military.

We are enjoying the sailing and the winds are starting to pick up so its getting fun.

Famous last words, because by about 8pm it was the start of what proved to be a gale with winds of 38Kts and by 11pm, gusts up to 45knots – this went on for several hours through the night. John’s had to check out from the land of the awake, and lie down on his bed as he was not feeling too well with swells of 2-3 m waves. I guess the Bay is living up to its name after all.

Josie Maria coped really well with the gale.  We had a reefed mainsail and genoa (reef 3), and auto-pilot on – so that we could shelter from the spray coming over the bow.  It was really comforting to know that Josie Maria managed the strong winds so well.  By 3am the winds dropped, the sky was clear all night and the moon nearly full so it was beautiful with the moons reflection on the water – it also meant that during the gale we could see the swell and waves rushing at us!!

August 21^st

As John hit his bed holding onto the contents of his stomach,  Rory had to put in a few more furls on the Genoa, but we are making good time at 8-9 kts.  Vicki who noted that the winds continued to pick up and they hit 45Kts. John tried to sleep, as its one of his most effective ways to stop seasickness.- the basic theory is that dead men cant feel anything.

However he can recall waking up suddenly as he was air-lifted from his bed and slammed with vicious force into the lee cloths on the side of the bed. His theory that fat men can’t fly was put to the test –he was proved wrong again.

Lee cloths are large strong pieces of cloth rigged on the side of your bed to help prevent you from falling out of your bed when the boat keels over during rough seas. What a good invention. They looked rather stupid pathetic anti-cuddle things, but we now can appreciate their practical nautical value. 10 points to the inventor ! 

John also had another moment of clarity, as he finally understood why Vicki purchased so many pillows, having to put several all around him to wedge himself into bed to reduce the force of impact as he was slammed about his side of our double bed. He eventually managed to fall asleep and get over his sea sickness. Resolving that this night is the first of many of such rocking and rolling nights.

In the morning we experienced our first fog – we learnt fog signals and later learnt how to send them automatically through our VHF radio via our intercom system!!

After this the day brought about a much calmer sea as we started to leave the Bay. However we kept on getting a ‘Pan Pan’ with lat/long co-ordinates of a fishing vessel many hundred of nautical miles from us who was reporting a man overboard in Spanish, probably a fishing vessel. We are days away from rendering assistance, and it was frustrating for me knowing that  someone was in that stormy ocean. I truly hoped they were found. It's a reminder that we cannot take any chances. We made sure we were tied to the boat at all times and had out life vests on, as well as not to go to the front and back of the boat where the waves would just roll over.

August 22^nd

A perfect state of bliss. A lovely lazy day, out in the sun, and no strong wind to be found.

John is kind of happy and kind of sad really. His stomach feels normal again so that makes him happy, and the ocean feels like a lake.

….But he is a bit sad because we are not sailing.  We are motoring at 8 Knots with our mainsail up with one reef to give us some stability. Our engine is so quiet you could almost believe we are actually sailing but we better not mention this as we could get strange stares from the rest of the crew. Unfortunately we have 10kts of wind and we need quite a bit more wind to our sails before we can turn off the engines. We need to get to Lisbon and the motor is the only way. One moment we are complaining about too much wind, and the next we are complaining that there is not enough. Someone up “there” needs to get their plan together. Please send us just enough wind to sail.

Everyone is taking advantage of the calm seas and sunny day. After the last 24 hours, it's a relief.  We are all working away – Vicki working on her charts and passage making plans to Cannes, Rory trying to figure out why our showers wont pump out water automatically and Mike is mesmerised by the plotter, checking out nearby container ships on AIS.  David is quietly reading a novel and is rather happy. He has just found out that he is the proud grandfather of Louis David, who was born a few hours ago. I noticed a tear in his eye and a wide brim of a smile. I’m glad we got the VSAT phone working so he could make a call to his son to find out news of the birth.  Congratulations!!

We are making good waves to Lisbon. On John’s menu, so as to ensure that he gains more weight so that he cannot get airborne again (Sue wont be pleased), we aim to eat Portuguese tarts (do they really have these in Portugal ?), Portuguese Chicken and some tasty hamon salted meat (Equivalent to prosciutto, an Italian delicacy) . John is also wondering why he is thinking of food when that was the last thing on his mind the night before ?

We (Vicki and I) worked together to create some piloting plans, which basically means a series of waypoints in Lat/Long on charts before we enter them on the chart plotter and figure out the route we will take to the Strait of Gibraltar and then onto Palma de Mallorca after we leave Lisbon. Mike (our instructor ensuring that we have all bases covered – so we will be save passage makers post Cannes!!). We plan to sort out some maintenance work at Palma and catch some Mediterranean sun. Talking about sun, it's getting rather hot now. We both are starting to like the idea of an endless summer.

We have arrived at Marina Cascais as the sun was setting. This was the first time Vicki had the opportunity to park the boat into a marina under the careful guidance of Rory, our skipper. As we arrived the town was in party mode, with a rock concert occurring near the marina. The whole town was out enjoying things, so we decided to join them. We all found out that beers here are 0.7% alcohol. Enough said. It took us a while to rise the following day.

Time to depart

Lee Cloths on the side of our beds

At the main square in Lisbon

John and David enjoying a coffee and a portuguese tart in Lisbon

The Handover of Josie Maria and departing Old England

The last week after handover was quite busy for us so we were unable to update the blog. Here is a rundown of the events as they happened:

Tuesday 6th August - Wednesday 7th August.

We completed the two day handover of our yacht. This involved the Oyster company taking us through every aspect of our new yacht and all its technical points.  What a huge amount of information to absorb!!  We really needed several more days. How much of this will we retain and how much will we have to figure out ? They gave us 5 very large ring binders full of detailed information to read.... Fortunately I videoed the key points of the handover so hopefully I will be able to go through these videos as a memory jogger. Liz, Katy and Sally-Anne unfortunately had to put up with us ignoring them most of the time as we were transfixed with technical jargon and operating procedures of such a complex yacht.

On the Tuesday we spent time learning all the plumbing on the yacht by lifting every floorboard and inspecting dozens upon dozens of pipes, seacocks, valves and pumps. We need to be able to understand exactly how everything is connected so that we are able to carry out preventative maintenance from the store of spares we are carrying on board, and what spares me may need for Oyster to send over in case they are needed.  The main thing for us is to learn as much as possible so that we can carry out urgent maintenance when we are all alone at sea. I must admit that its a daunting task..  We are starting to realize with sharper clarity that we will be on our own on a vast ocean. Oyster assures us that they are only a phone call or email away, and as much as this is true, we still have to deal with any eventuality.

Wednesday was more about learning other systems such as the watermaker and the various instruments, as well as testing the sails and winches. We used a bow thruster for the very first time and flattened its battery which made coming into the marina very exciting. The Oyster crew were very much in control and brought us in safely. At least I now know that the bow thruster has its own battery and it runs out rather quickly. What can I say…It’s controlled through a joystick and as an avid gamer, I like my joysticks…

Thursday 8^th August

Handover is complete, but will be doing the technology handover on Friday. We officially pick up the boat today and have started moving all our boxes from our storage facility as well as the storage facility at Oyster onto the boat. OMG ! How much stuff did we bring ! Maybe too many toys ?

The general consensus is that there is no way we are going to get everything in on this boat. We will have to select what to keep, what to send back and what to throw out !

We went on our first provisioning trip to Tesco and in memory of my mum Maria, I decided that for dinner tonight I will make my first pasta dish on the boat; “Tagliatelle con involtini”. Yum.

Tomorrow we will be meeting with Gavin Painter our resident IT Guru from IT@Sea, a very helpful chap who will take us through all our systems. The important systems for me are our satellite internet systems ; VSAT and BGAIN, as they are vital to keep in touch with the Academy of Interactive Entertainment staff, friends and family.  I am looking forward on how to   use the sound system so I can start playing some song from my library. Gavin has made a number of very useful recommendations when we were deciding what to install on the yacht. He is the man as far as configuring your Oyster.

Friday 9^th August

Gavin arrived, but we were running late as we were all exhausted. Last night was a rather long night as we worked hard in packing things on the boat.  We decided not to sleep on the boat after the dinner but to go back to the hotel. Trying to cook on the boat for the first time was challenging as we have to learn the systems and deliver a hot meal all at the same time. Regardless of our lack of sleep, it was tremendous fun as we started making Josie Maria our home for the next year or so. Liz, Katy, Sally-Anne, David, Vicki and I drank plenty of wine. I feel like I have achieved little today( I tend to gas bag to just about anyone who walks past admiring our yacht), but the rest of the gang worked very efficiently in sorting things on the boat.

We were expecting our registration papers to arrive today but unfortunately they have not arrived. Without those papers we cannot leave on Monday as planned. This might get interesting.

Saturday 10^th August

David and I started early ; my job was to try to figure out how we could use the Lazarette (large storage area at the back of the boat) and fit in the Seabobs, while David focused on figuring out a better way of storing the spinnaker – in the end we ended up storing it in the lazarette. After the 3-4^th attempt we have managed to store quite a bit in the laz and I think with the clever storing of things by Vicki, Liz and Katy, whom I have been told are Tetris masters,  I think we might just get just about everything on the boat after all. At least its looking hopeful.

Sunday 11^th August

We will be joined by our instructor Mike Dymond,  and Rory Gillard from Vortec Marine. They are very experienced sailors ; Rory has loads of experience on Oysters and will be invaluable in helping Vicki and I understand the beast of a yacht we have purchased, and Mike will help train both Vicki and I, as he is a trainer of trainers.  We feel rather humble to be in his care. At least our friends and family will feel a little bit less concerned knowing that we are undertaking additional training particularly in relation to our new yacht. Mike and Rory will be with us all the way to Cannes, France. Our first port of call will be the Channel Island of Guernsey. When we arrive there,  we are hoping to hire a 40 foot vessel in Guernsey so we can do some close quarter tacking and jibing, man over board etc, so we can brush up on our skills. We have also accepted on board Stephen Lambert of Undercover Boss fame, on board to the Channel Islands as he has purchased an Oyster and wants to get some hands on experience. 

We decided to leave on Tuesday after learning that the registration papers for the boat will arrive sometime on Monday.

Monday 12^th August

We managed today to fit just about everything on the boat. Woot. Vicki, Katy and Liz are true Tetris masters of packing. I did have to handle a number of heckling remarks on the number of toys I’m bringing on this trip, but I’m not concerned. I will enjoy my toys, especially the quadcopter from which I hope to grab some rather nice aerial shots. I hope that the Seabobs will get a good use as they are so heavy and take so much space in the Laz. I have high hopes that family and friends will have fun and make the whole storing and sailing with loads of toys worthwhile. 

Tuesday 13^th August

Alas, most good plans never survive first contact. We had a number of niggling issues with the new yacht, which we expected as this kind of thing happens, and are glad we found the more complex ones before we left. The Oyster team are amazing. They jumped on the issues straight away and our project manager, Stephen Parkinson was on top of getting things sorted out with the their commissioning team managed by Adrian. Vicki and I  were duly impressed, and very grateful. I was also very grateful to the Oyster employee who took the time to recharge the Seabobs as the batteries needed to be kept recharged for them to not to develop problems. Its nice when someone goes out of their way to look after a client.

Unfortunately this has meant that we have had to postpone our departure till tomorrow. We decide that we would have our farewell dinner tonight and it was really nice to have Katy and Liz here in Ipswich to see us off in the morning.

Wednesday 14^th August

Again we experienced further delays. We had to wait until the tender was returned from getting an overnight repair, so we have moved our departure till this afternoon. Its really not an issue, but we are getting itchy feet as we want to set sail ! As long as we are leaving knowing that all the key equipment is working, who really cares, right ?

I would advise any new Oyster owner to allow at least a week to work through the usual niggles. We did not allow enough time. Oyster are great and will pull all stops, but if you have more time, it's a lot less stressful for everyone, including the poor suffering Oyster team keen to see us off on our adventure of a lifetime.

We finally left Ipswich. UK at 5:15pm. It was quite uneventful in the end. We jumped on and sailed off…waving goodbye to Old England.

We are finally off to realise Vicki's life long dream.

Thursday 15^th August

The first reality of our cruising lifestyle hit home last night. Passage making is all about shift work ! I new this before we left, but it really hit home. We ran a roster across three teams of two people : 3 hours on watch, and 6 hours off to sleep, except its hard to grab sleep when your yacht is sailing along and all the action is happening upstairs in the cockpit.  I felt like a zombie this morning. Will need to snatch some more sleep.

This is our first night out at sea, crossing the English Channel. We were worried that there would be a lot of other large container ships, but the Channel is well organised. There are ‘lanes’ where container boats  and other large vessels go up one side and others large ships go the other side.  There is a special lane for little yachts like ours, away from those monsters of the seas. David, Mike and Rory made it look so easy.

Friday 16^th August

We arrived in Guernsey early this morning. I don't know the exact time as I went to bed after finishing my 1am shift, but David and Vicki stayed up and lowered the anchor with Rory. I recovered a little from my zombie state, rising up and taking a look at a spectacular sight. I must admit that I have felt not a twinge of sea-sickness during the last two days. The ocean was very calm. We said good-bye to Stephen, and decided that now was a good time to grab a quick bite to eat. Seafood sounds like a good idea. We had some rather nice seafood especially the local crab, which Vicki is allergic to.   Tomorrow we will do some sailing of a rental and get our rusty skills back in shape. Its now time to fire up the internet, scan for a free marine wifi hotspot and post on Josie Maria’s blog.

Now this is a tidy cabin..

David Cutcliffe

Vicki at the helm on handover day

Katy at the helm on handover day

David giving Vicki some pointers

Katy and Sally-Anne

Stephen, Mike and Rory

We are finally underway,

We have finally arrived in Ipswich for the handover of our yacht. Its a fantastic yacht, full of very nice features. We threw a party to celebrate and invited folks from Oyster and their contractors to come along as well as some of our family from Australia and the UK.

On our voyage we will be joined by David Cutcliffe, an experienced yachtsman who is also doing the sailing adventure of a lifetime with us. Here is David helping out trying to find tools from all the spare parts currently stored at Oyster that we will be bringing onto Josie Maria in a few days ! We certainly have a lot of stuff, more on this in later posts - it should be quite funny...

David Cutcliffe

John, Vicki and sister Katy

and big sister, Liz

 Matt, Liz, Vicki and Katy

Some of the wonderful folks at Oyster who gave us a great inauguration/naming party

 Sally-Anne, Liz, John, Vicki and Katy

Now our plans are to complete our two day handover where we get to learn all about how everything works, and go for a sail.

We are also receiving a few requests from family and friends to join us. I can say that November 2013 right through the end of January 2014, when we are in the Caribbean, we are totally full ! We have some friends who will be coming over in all of February2014, and March 2014 looks like its fairly open. The Galapagos leg, probably mid April 2014 is also fast filling up. There are some great times to be had.