First of all, I’d like to thank Mario for his contributions to this blog. He was truly able to capture some of the most beautiful things we experienced with his words. Thank you for your writing tips. The task of writing updates for the blog falls to me and Carlos. Mario, I hope to be able to come close to the standard you have set.
Mario, you left me with one other important tip before you left: “make sure the weather forecast is solid before leaving to Ile de la Madeleine”. Perhaps we should have checked more weather sources. At Riviere-Au-Renard, Environment Canada and the Weather Network had called for sunny days for three days straight. Well I wish I could take those forecasters and give them a seat on the boat as we hit a storm of 35 knot winds (approx. 70 km/hr), 3 metre waves hitting us every 3 seconds and light hail.
Leaving from Riviere-Au-Renard, Carlos and I were well slept, well fed and anxious to make use of the forecasted ‘good weather’ in order to sail the forty-some hours (150 nautical miles) to Ile de La Madeleine in the middle of the St Lawrence Gulf. The plan was to rotate at the helm every 4 hours. We left on the 13th of July at 11AM.
Upon leaving Riviere-Au-Renard we were greeted by 2 metre waves every 3 seconds and strong 15 knot winds. Keeping a broad reach on our working jib, Carlos immediately set to work to get his self-steering system in order. His system, nicknamed Brisa, essentially takes control of the tiller and keeps the boat on course regardless of small shifts in wind, and wave/current shifts. Brisa hadn’t proved very successful during earlier attempts in the St. Lawrence, but once we got it started, it worked like a charm. Kept us on course, better than either Carlos or I could do.
With only a few minor adjustments every 8 hours or so, Brisa kept us going. This allowed us to enjoy the surroundings, sleep, eat, talk. We witnessed dolphins playing in the waves. During the night, not a single hour would go by without dolphins swimming by our boat under the full moon. And in the morning we saw in the distance a huge spout of water. Judging by its distance and the height of these spouts of water, we could only assume that it came from the biggest of all whales; the Blue Whale.
(Mario, you missed out on 50 million!)
Anyways, the morning of the 14th we raised the mainsail (we had until that point only been running on the working Jib). With both sails we were making a solid 4 – 6 knots and our ETA was around 4 am the next morning. As the sun set that evening, no land was in sight, the sun turned the water into gold. But clouds ahead were telling us that we were heading towards trouble.
This should have been a sign to take down the mainsail before the night. In all honesty I think Brisa had created a sense of apathy amongst Carlos and me. Not only that, but according to the forecast, the wind was to die down during the night and only to pick up to 10-15 knots the next morning. Why lose out on our speed and take down the mainsail? In fact, if we had followed this advice given to us by the wise Elizabeth, we would have avoided much of our troubles the next morning.
The winds never died down and by 2AM they were picking up with warnings of squalls (violent gust of wind) on channel 16. Tired, Carlos took his shift while I tried to sleep. But the winds and waves were causing the boat to heel violently. By 4AM as we were approaching Ile de la Madeleine, winds up to 35 knots now (70 km/hr) with squalls hitting us hard. Waves at 3 metres with 3 seconds between each wave. Rain turning into hail. Carlos carried us on. He made the admitted mistake of failing to ‘heave to’ (turning the boat into the headwind) and taking down the mainsail.
Carlos called on me to take over the helm as he tired. The waves were washing the deck by this point. We were only some 8 miles away from Port Aubert when I took over. Our speed up to 7 knots with this wind, the boat continued to heel over violently. Carlos, attempting to sleep, heard noises which he believed could lead to structural damage to the boat and immediately came up to take down the jib. On the mainsail alone, our speed dropped to 1.5-2 knots (2 nautical miles an hour). We still had 3 miles to go. 2 hours in these conditions were going be tough, so we turned on the motor to help our speed. Even then, the boat was still heeling over, bring splashes of icy cold waters over the deck. Next thing we knew, the line we had for the boom preventer (the recently added feature to the boat) fell into the water. Carlos’ second admitted mistake for not keeping the line attached to the boat. Before having enough time to react, the rope caught in the motor’s propeller and stalled the engine.
Waves were too high to position our outboard engine. The risk of losing the outboard engine and support was too great. We decided that the best course of action would be to request a tow from the coast guard. This was a difficult decision for Carlos who has been sailing for forty-five years without ever needing assistance from the coast guard. Within an hour, the red and white boat arrived, gave us a rope and towed us to a small fisherman’s wharf. They refused to take us to our original destination merely 3 miles away. They told us the winds were even worst in that direction, so it was worth going the extra 4 miles to this fisherman’s wharf.
Various people came out to watch our ‘epic’ arrival. We were frustrated, exhausted, disappointed, but relieved as well. After such a solid 46 hours of sailing, so close to our destination, it was sad to have to arrive in this way. We felt that this would the end of our journey. No more Nova Scotia, no more Brazil.
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