"The Minnow" ARC 2005 Atlantic Crossing

Mike's Exciting Day 7 Update!

Another good day of sailing. And another day without email and outgoing
phones.

We started out the day in medium to light wind following from 120-140
degrees off of the boat direction. And we were flying Whomper.

Whomper is really, really big. In 10-15 knots of true wind we were doing
8-10 knots. Perfect. The wind gradually increased and we found ourselves
doing 10-12 knots. Even better. With the true wind varying from 15-20 knots
we had apparent wind just over 10 knots.

But with the true wind increasing, and already on the top edge of wind for
Whomper, we were keeping a close eye out. We would need to pull Whomper in
quickly if we got more wind. We did, and we did. True wind hit 25, apparent
was still below 15, and . boat speed surged to 17+ knots. Very nice. But
time for a new sail.

David, Bob, Serge, and I quickly pulled down Whomper, stuffed it into the
forward hatch on the right, and let out the gennaker. (this part is
interesting as it narrows the blame for leaving the hatch open to four of
us) The wind increased more, as we passed near a squall (rain shower). Out
went the solent and in came the gennaker.

The wind let up a bit and we let the gennaker back out. The solent was still
out with the gennaker and we went fast. By pulling the solent in and out
while we left the gennaker out we found that we could go a little faster
with three sails up. The books say don't do it, but we experimented and
found it gained about 5% or better speed in these conditions. Most of the
rest of the day was spent with the gennaker and solent out.

It seems like we should be making really good time compared to the other
boats. But we didn't really know since we weren't getting email. They might
all be going faster than us.

Fishing report:

Fishing is interesting when the boat is moving at 10+ knots. On one pole we
have heavy line (50lb.). The other pole has something about 200-300lb. line.
When we get a fish on at this speed, it's almost impossible to reel when the
fish is in the water. When it comes to the surface, it's time to make hay.
Ideally the fish just kind of skis and skids along the surface. If the fish
dives, you just have to wait until it surfaces.

I was reeling in a fish today and it jumped out of the water. When it hit
the air, the tension on the rod and the line was enough to pull the
three-pound dolphin about 50 feet in the air toward the boat. It was kind of
scary. It's the same kind of action that occurs when Jerry is removing a
bass lure from a tree.

Anyway, the line wrapped around the tip of the pole. After some thrashing, I
got the line clear and reeled the fish in. Dolphins are notoriously hard to
kill. This one was dead on arrival from the pounding across the waves. Thus
easy to clean!

Arts and Entertainment:

Today's musical entertainment was comprised of Bob and I practicing the
sousaphone parts of "In the Mood" on the baritone. It was ugly.