Easter Island to Juan Fernandez - April 10 to April 24, 2003

So with Roger aboard were prepared for the next leg of our journey. We were still at anchor in Hanga Roa where we had completed our repairs in the morning, but as we were concerned about changing weather conditions, we wanted to get away as soon as possible. At 1520 on April 10, we pulled up the 225 feet of chain and headed out into the clear blue ocean.

The first day was peaceful and the weather pretty quiet. We spent quite a bit of time bobbing around due to a lack of wind, and the autopilot couldn't hold course. Gradually the wind built up, but so did the seas until we found ourselves into our first squall. I think that all of our minds were on the forestay and, sure enough, at 0700 on the morning of April 12, the forestay came down with a thud. Fortunately, the entire assembly stayed aboard and didn't damage anything else on the way down. Also, fortunately, the squall had passed and we were left in calm conditions.

The jib halyard had chafed right through, but the rest of the unit was intact. We really had to kick ourselves as the repair had held very well, it was a simple problem of the eyepiece having unscrewed from the rod. In retrospect, we would have completely epoxied the piece together to prevent any turning, although there was quite a bit of unscrewing that had to happen for it all to come apart!! It would have been easy to prevent this setback, but who would have predicted it? Learning on a boat can be expensive!

We promptly rearranged the deck and lashed down the furling and forestay. Our dismal performance of a mere 48 nautical miles the previous day had us a little down in the spirits before the loss of the forestay, but now we had to muster up as much as possible to keep morale up. An important lesson, and a most important task in any cruising situation. DP was still rocking around far too much for us to be able to rig the spare forestay, but by the following afternoon, conditions were acceptable... or close to acceptable... Remember that the swing across the deck may seem fairly flat, but at the top of a 20 metre mast, things are a little different... It took 2 hours to insert the clevis and cotter pins for the top of the temporary stay - a job that normally took under one minute. I discovered that it would have been helpful to be an octopus as I needed both legs and both arms to keep from being swung right off the mast! I'm greatful to my dentist back in Victoria for work well done as my teeth became the most important "working limb" for holding things and bringing up the spare stay.

The weather held out quite nicely, and we were pleased to have the job accomplished. We could now bring out some more mainsail and the staysail, the latter of which we soon discovered had to be handled manually as the bearings in the head swivel had seized up pretty well and were unmoveable. It took me about 3 days to recover from the bruising and aches from my mast-climbing adventure, but we were all relieved to have the task completed and to have confidence that this repair would hold.
It was a tense trip with variable wind conditions. We tried to keep south of the Pacific high pressure system, but it seemed to follow us, so we spent quite a bit of time bobbing around. Diesel was a limiting factor, so we were careful about excessive running of the Perkins and waited patiently for the wind to come. Perhaps we were lucky as we were concerned about the forestay.

As an additional note about the structure of DP... we realized on this trip the value of the cutter rig and the baby stay. She has an unusal design for an inmast furled boat as she has a "bendy" mast, hydraulic backstay, and babystay to help with the process. Although we are very careful and seldom ever use this "feature" of DP, we were pleased to have the extra support from the other two forward stays when the headstay left us.

The weather was quite fluky on this crossing ranging from 25 knots, 30 knot gusts to 0 in a matter of hours. We spent quite a bit of time reefing and letting out the main as well as raising and lowering the staysail. Talk about exercise!!

On the morning of the 24th we encountered our first boat in 2 weeks, a large fishing vessel. We had a wonderful chat with them across the radio and managed to arrange to trade for some fish. When they said that they had a small fish for us, we clearly didn't understand the Chilean version of small.... we spent the remainder of the afternoon cutting up, vacuum packing, and freezing 30 kg of swordfish!! What a wonderful introduction to Chilean hospitality!!

Our final arrival in Cumberland bay was 1530 where we were able to anchor in 45 feet. We prompty located Roger's wife, Ulli, who was beginning to wonder what happened to us. Due to our lack of sail, wind, and our desire to travel cautiously, we were a few days later than we expected. Fortunately, Ulli had made the best of exploring the island, and we started planning the return trip before we had even left!!

Our first trip in was to the customs and immigration office to check in. The last boat to pass through Cumberland Bay was Pardy's vessel, Talesin, which had been over a month before us. The town was delightful, with many small wooden boats and horses seemed to be the primary form of transportation. The people were extremely friendly and somehow the language barrier didn't seem to exist.

We had dropped anchor just off of the hotel that Ulli had been staying at. She had made many friends there, including the owner, his son, and his granson. Subsequently, we planned a parting dinner - actually a lobster feast. When we arrived, there were a few concerned guests discussing the possiblity that they wouldn't be able to leave Isla Robinson Crusoe in the morning. Earlier in the day, a group of doctors were flying in on their routine medical rounds for the local community. Upon landing, the pilot seemed to have forgotten to put down the landing gear. One of the guests had a beautiful video of the event, and the damage to the plane was quite extensive. Fortunately, nobody was hurt, but there was some question about how the plane would be removed from the airstrip! As we later found out the next morning, the airstrip does have some heavy moving equipment, so to move the small Piper was not a big problem.

We spent a few days exploring Juan Fernandez, but somehow it simply wasn't long enough. The anchorage infront of the hotel was tranquil and we were fortunate to have clear, pleasant weather. Morale was exceptionally high and we prepared to set sail once again. It is always sad and difficult to say goodbye...