An Atlantic Crossing - From John Cussins
This was to be my second crossing in two years. The previous year (2001), my brother & I had sailed Haecceia, a Contest 48, across from Tenerife to Antigua with the Blue Water Rally. This year, I was doing the trip in my own boat, Wind Dancer, a 55CS, with a family crew but also as part of a Blue Water Rally.
I had not regretted my decision to forego the joys of going on the ARC. The Blue Water people have always been very supportive, the people on the rally very nice socially and the thought of being part of a semi race with 225 other boats appalls me, to say nothing of the socializing which is a big part of the ARC events, not that I am a loner or don’t like a drink or two!
I had learnt quite a lot about preparation from last year’s trip, but my main concern centered on electric consumption. Haecceia was a 12v. boat with loads of computers; my brother is a professor and wanted computing power for every imaginable thing. I was worried that we were going to run out of diesel for the generator on the crossing, despite having a wind generator and solar panels, and I think we would have if we hadn’t started shutting things down after the first week or so.
When specifying Wind Dancer, I elected to have a towed generator in place of the wind and solar generators which had not proved very effective when sailing down wind previously. Computers were limited to lap tops – easily replaceable. Hydraulic in mast furling as opposed to fully batten main on Haecceia – getting too old for all that jumping around in a 50 knt. squall!
I did approach this year’s crossing with a great deal of confidence. I have read all the stories of gear failures on previous ARCs and expected the same. We hadn’t had any last year. The autopilot ran faultlessly, the generator and watermaker were 100% reliable, some problems with a Doyle sail. The only “happening” was filling the bilge with fresh water when my brother decided that the washing machine needed some exercise in mid Atlantic! Nothing broke. It seems to me that problems occur due to poor installation or under specification, rather than due to problems with the equipment itself.
Wind Dancer had been up to Norway – an idyllic trip – for her proving cruise. Then back to Medenblik for a few warranty things and then to Southampton for the Boat Show. We set off after the show for Falmouth to await suitable weather for the Biscay crossing. There’s always a certain nervousness about this leg but we finished up motoring across and in truth motored mostly down the Spanish & Portuguese coasts. Just no, or very little wind. I will not relate the details of this trip as this report is supposed to concentrate on the Atlantic crossing.
We arrived in Gibraltar early October and spent three weeks there provisioning and getting to know the other participants on the Blue Water Rally. Gib is a good
