W/e 10 DEC 23: LAUNCH WEEK

Where am I?

Latitude: 017°01.237’ N

Longitude: 061°46.574’ W

On board Fujin II, moored stern-to at Catamaran Marina in Falmouth Harbour, Antigua.

How is the weather? 

Flat sea, soft breezes and occasional rain showers, sometimes heavy. The typical pattern seems to be flat calm at 0700 building to moderate breeze by noon. Calm again at 1300, breeze and squalls through to 1830, then calm descending again during  hours of darkness.

What am I feeling? 

The usual joys and tribulations of the first week after launch – at first an overwhelming sense of near-panic as problems, big and small, become immediately apparent, followed by deep satisfaction as each is checked off the list day by day. “Keep Calm and Carry On” should be the sailor’s motto! The Notes app on my iPhone is indispensable for driving home the quantum of tasks yet to be accomplished as well as reinforcing the progress I am making!

But then, there’s the joy of a GnT at 5:30pm as the sky turns blood orange, the sun dips behind the hill to the west of me and the air rapidly cools in the evening breeze, celebrating the end of another day’s work. The sounds of a marina with the gentle lap of water on the hull, wind in the rigging, sailors working on their neighbouring yachts and the soft lilt of Caribbean accents drifting down the dock is something special, bringing a deep peace to the end of the day.

What has happened this week?

I departed JFK at 0830 on Sunday 3rd December (90 minutes late) in a driving rain storm and arrived three and a half hours later in another world: a turquoise sea, azure skies and soft, warm breezes. Man, it’s nice to be back in Antigua!

I shared a taxi from the airport with a charter yacht broker from Newport, RI, here for the annual charter show which started on 4th December. It’s somewhat jarring to hear that the market for chartering of super yachts is back to its pre-Covid craziness, while death and destruction rain down in Ukraine and Israel/Gaza and economic uncertainty is felt almost everywhere. But perhaps the super-rich need their distractions as much as the rest of us?

We launched on Monday 4th without incident and moored alongside at Bailey’s Boatyard to run through initial engine and instrument checks. The usual long list of issues emerged which we have  more or less resolved (see below).

Falmouth Harbour feels like home now, after three years of being based at Catamaran Marina/Bailey’s Boatyard (both owned by Sir Hugh Bailey). Familiar faces, warm smiles, a chill vibe and of course, spectacular scenery and sunsets all conspire quickly to reintroduce me to the altered state of Caribbean sailing.

On Friday morning, we moved to a stern-to mooring at Catamaran Marina – Helen (the redoubtable grande dame of the local community, manager of the marina and partner of Sir Hugh) found me a slot. Actually all of the slots at the marina have been taken for the entire season by yachts that have or will come in from Europe either for charter or with their owners. Richard Matthews, the founder and previous owner of Oyster, has his 82’ yacht, “Midnight”, moored just across from Fujin II. Matthews sold Oyster Marine to a couple of Dutch hedge fund bro’s (actually real brothers!) who ended up putting it into bankruptcy in 2018. Richard Hadida, a Nelson enthusiast and British tech entrepreneur, bought the company a week or so later and it has since gone from strength to strength, thankfully.

Catamaran Marina & Hotel has recovered from the ravages of Covid-19 along with the rest of Antigua. Cloggy’s, an Antigua institution, opened at the marina in November, taking the space previously occupied by the Italian restaurant Cambusa which closed during Covid. Cloggy’s was sadly a victim of the October fire which destroyed the Antigua Yacht Club complex just across the harbour. But it’s fantastic to see them come back with the same staff here at Catamaran Marina. The Cloggy’s crew are an institution, so many thanks and kudos to Travis, Dante and the other staff there – it’s a lovely location with relaxed, friendly service and much less frenetic than their AYC place.

This week has been busy with all the initial jobs one plans for after a relaunch. The major jobs accomplished so far are:

1. Replacing both the raw water pump and the fuel pump on my Onan generator. The ceramic seal on the raw water pump was leaking last year, causing corrosion to the fuel pump. Chris from Marine Power Services did a heroic job in sorting out the challenge of lying face down with only one hand able to get to the offending parts. It’s a really tough installation even to change the impeller, a routine service job. Chris is a star and his “never say die” attitude gets the job done!
2. Handover of the new MasterVolt lithium battery set up and resolution of some network problems with the instruments. Arougoo and Denny at Marionics (MasterVolt agent) are methodical and committed to solving problems. And such nice people too.
3. Sorting out our electric davit motors (used to lift the dinghy out of the water at our stern). I had ordered two new motors which use dyneema line rather than steel wire (on the basis that dyneema is easier for me to replace myself than steel wire) but sadly one of the motors did not work and will be replaced free of charge. So now we have one working on wire and one on dyneema. Oyster have been very helpful in facilitating a quick turnaround for this – we should have the new motor by end of December. The safe working load of our davits is 225kg and our dinghy plus engine and fuel weigh around 150kg. So at sea, we can store some extra stores, garbage, dinghy anchor, grab bag, etc in the dinghy, which is very useful.
4. Vishal from Antigua Rigging made up a new dyneema lifting strop so that I can lift our dinghy using a spare halyard just forward of the mast. This means we can now take the dinghy out of the water alongside as well as at the stern. So we have the option to leave the stern free for swimming or showering outside. 
5. We’ve installed a new Fusion music player as an upgrade to the unit we had previously. Now we can connect easily via Bluetooth or Apple AirPlay. A small thing but a bit of Jimmy Buffet in the cockpit of an evening is important!
6. I’ve resolved a small but annoying freshwater leak issue in the forward heads – the problem emerged last year but with one thing and another, I didn’t deal with it. The main issue with a small leak in the freshwater system is that the fresh water pressure pump will switch on to maintain pressure, making a noise. The noise is not loud but as skipper, every noise is annoying and can indicate an issue. Now it’s fixed and the freshwater pump can relax a little.
7. The port side staysail winch, an Andersen 48ST manual two speed winch, was not spinning freely so I took it apart and serviced it. It’s now as good as new. Oyster’s standard winches are Lewmar but I specified the all-stainless steel Andersen winches. A bit of bling is rather satisfying!

So as we end week 1, Fujin II is connected to shore power and we can run aircon without the generator. Actually we rarely use the aircon but it is usually necessary when in a marina as the breeze always seems to be blocked somehow. At anchor, the breeze is enough to keep us reasonably cool. I’m typically running the aircon from around 1500 to 1700 to allow me to attend to jobs down below during the heat of the day.

I should say something about Antigua Rigging, owned and run by Stan Pearson, ably assisted by Raphan “Raphie” Benjamin. They’ve looked after Fujin II at Catamaran Marina/Bailey’s Boatyard for the last 3 years. They and their team, esp Chanteze, Sanchia and  Vishal, are a great bunch of guys/gals. Skilled and experienced at what they do, with a positive attitude that helps to build confidence. I’m really happy we moved here from Grenada as we prepare for our 2024 adventure.

Monday is a holiday in Antigua so I have some time to clean the interior and exterior without any service personnel on board. From Tuesday onwards, we have a few things to address:

1. Our Raymarine tri-data transducer, an instrument which fits though the bottom of the hull and measures depth, boat speed and water temperature, is not sending data to our instruments. We cannot sail safely without this operating correctly. There was one transducer available with the Raymarine agent but that one also does not work (which I find really odd!) so the service guys have ordered a new one which should clear Customs on Wednesday. We can then fit it and, hopefully, resolve the issue.

2. We have had an issue since launch in 2015 with the wind transducer (which is on the top of the mast, 22 metres above the sea) sending wildly fluctuating wind speed readings to the instruments, but only when we are sailing (we’ve had wind readings of 70kts or 80kts when the actual wind speed is more like 15kts! At anchor or in a marina, the readings work normally. We have tried a number of solutions since launch, to no avail. Part of the problem is that the issue only occurs when we are sailing. I suspect that it is due to a problem with the cable from the top of the mast into the Raymarine network inside the boat – it’s the only link in the chain we have not replaced. Cap and Ickwan from Signal Locker (Raymarine agent for Antigua) were on board on Tuesday to take a look. I am hoping to see them back, perhaps with Cap’s son, William, after the holiday. It will be super to have this problem finally resolved after 8 years.

3. Julian needs to come and commission the watermaker now that I have the generator up and running. The watermaker produces 72 litres of fresh, drinkable, water per hour by ingesting sea water and putting it through a high pressure reverse osmosis process. It is essential for independent, long distance sailing. Normally I would do the commissioning myself but given our voyaging plans for 2024, it makes sense to have a qualified engineer come and check the system. I have a comprehensive set of spares for the watermaker but they are complicated systems and having an experienced engineer check everything will give me a bit of peace of mind.

4. Franklin from A&F Sails in English Harbour will come perhaps Monday, to measure up for a new cover for our dinghy when it is up on the davits. Ideally we want a cover because when sailing long distance, we don’t want rain water accumulating in the dingy. The canvas cover will prevent this and will also let us store our grab bag, bottled water, rubbish, etc in the dinghy. On passage, everything bio-degradable goes into the sea while the rest is washed (so it doesn’t go foosty) and bagged up for proper disposal at the destination port. I also need to pick Franklin’s brain on how best to clean up the Strata Glass windows in our spray hood which are looking distinctly opaque.

5. I need to reset the water tank sender. This is an electronic device which sends data on the amount of water remaining in the water tank to a display at our chart table. It is currently not reading correctly. To reset it, I have to first empty the tank, then do an “empty” reset procedure, then fill the tank from the marina’s water supply and do a “full” reset procedure. A bit of a palaver but important that the gauge reads correctly. It’s interesting that the Spirit, the Oyster 575 on my port side, had exactly the same issue. Ryan (one of their crew) was able to run through how to fix the issue. The tank is fairly full now, so I will probably do this on Thursday.

6. Before we move off the dock here, we will fill up with diesel (our fuel tank capacity is 850 litres and right now we have around 350 l left), water (our water tank capacity is 750 litres), gas (we have 2 bottles of gas for the oven and 4  burner cooktop and for the topside BBQ and both need to be filled) and petrol for the dinghy. 

7. Next week will see me organise all our ships spares and stores, complete a full inventory, clean the decks and the interior and be ready for Patrick’s arrival on Sunday 17th. WD40 will be sprayed liberally as I try to hold back the ravages of the salt water environment. Hopefully, Fujin will be ship shape and raring to go by then and we can move off to the anchorage pending Elizabeth’s arrival on 20th and Katie’s on 22nd!

8. I need to order a couple of things from Oyster since they are anyway sending me the replacement davit motor – a new padded vinyl cover for the mast down below (the existing one has rotted from the heat and the foam padding is disintegrating) and new leather anti-chafe pads for our dinghy davits. These protect the top of the dinghy pontoons from chafe when the dingy is up on the davits – the existing ones are still serviceable so this is more cosmetic really.

I’ll report on progress on these items next week but bear in mind that 

“The best laid schemes o’ Mice an’ Men

Gang aft agley,

An’ lea’e us nought but grief an’ pain,

For promised joy”!

Future blog posts will, I hope, be more succinct – the first week aboard is always frenetic!

Fujin out!