Day 2 to Minerva Reef

The first night of ocean passage is alway a bit tough as you are getting your sea legs and getting into the rhythm of night watches.

A bit of excitement we didn't need happened at midnight during the handover when Ann was coming on watch. The sound of metal landing on the deck. Fortunately it didn't go overboard and we found the offending piece. A bolt in a car on the main sheet traveller had seared so we had to get the main sail down to take pressure of it. Taking the sail down at midnight while we were still getting settled on our first night wasn't part of the plan but it all went well.

I have spare bolts to repair it but need to dismantle quite a bit of the traveller system and can't risk losing bits overboard so it looks like a job for Minerva Reef.

Fortunately we are sailing straight down wind so the loss of the main sail isn't a major blow to us at this angle of the wind. So it is spinnaker during the day and motor sail with the genoa at night. The wind is dropping out in a couple of days so we will be motoring anyway.

We put the spinnaker up today and thankfully there weren't any boats near us to see the mess we got into. The spinnaker can be a handfull at the best of times when it is just the 2 of us and it has been awhile since we used the spinnaker and neither of us had had much sleep. The sail started to open before we could check all the ropes and sure enough I had ropes in the wrong places. It was a struggle to get it sorted with this huge sail half deplored flapping around out the front of the boat and ropes slapping about with great force. With good team work we were able to fixed it without getting the sail in the water and driving over it and no breakages nor injuries.

It was worth the effort. The spinnaker is a great sail for down wind for both speed and comfort. Once the spinnaker was set the boat motion is much smoother and it was a very comfortable sail for the next 5 hours.