The Jester Challenge 2006

I arrived back in Langstone Harbour yesterday. I got as far as 41N 42W, before I broke a starboard inner shroud coming out of an F8 [my 4th one of two days or more]. Had to tack onto port very quickly. While St John's in Newfoundland was closer, did not want to risk Starboard Tack, so I made Flores in the Azores on Port Tack, where I affected temporary repairs. I still cannot believe that I have made it all the way back to Langstone on Port Tack in anything above F3 [I did do a day on Starboard Tack in an F2, between Start Point and Portland Bill].

I thought I had read everything I needed to know about the various routes. I had studied the Routing Charts and worked out that if I chose the Northern route as it offered consistently good winds at least for the first half and offered the statistic that only 10% of the time would I be subjected to F8 or above. My first storm was a F10 on Saturday 10 June. The water turned white like a milkshake except the spume was flying directly at me and not sitting gently on the top. Lay-a-hull for 36 hours, most of the time at a 60 degree or more angle. Water streaming through the stormboards and waves breaking over me constantly. I had streamed warps, which gave me a slight stern to wind and waves aspect and while I was whipped around through 180 degrees twice, I never suffered the dreaded 360, I was anticipating. After 36 hours I sailed south to try and avoid the rest of the low and on checking my rigging found it much looser [probably stretched] than I like. Tightened it up but I think it had already weakened in the Storm. Following two days of sea fog with quarter mile visibility, a week later I encountered another F8 lasting two days and decided as a result of this I would switch to the intermediate route and headed dead south for three days, I then set a course for 45N 35W. Two more F8s and I had got as low as 41N 42W, when during a routine check of my rigging I found I had only 7 of my 19 strands of wire on my starboard inner shroud holding. Not knowing how strong the remaining strands where I tacked onto Port immediately.

I am interested to note that Eric in Sterren had kept fairly close to my initial track, but seemed to only encounter F7, but he was well in front of me and that Pete Hill in Shanti when I came South was actually in front of me. I don't know if conditions were unusually fierce this year [the routing charts would indicate so], but if not I would offer very strong advice in the future that the Northern Route was not recommended for _any_ boat under 30 feet. Although that said I had perhaps the worst ballast ratio in the Jester fleet [35%] and did survive an F10, however my speed during the F8s was at best 2.5 knots and generally at 90 degrees to the desired direction.