Fog Bound

After a very foggy evening (right) we woke this morning to even thicker fog (below) reducing the visibility to about 50 metres. We could just about make out a couple of boats on the moorings next to us but the town of Newport was certainly nowhere to be seen.

Again, we tuned into the weather forecast and with nothing but fog, showers and thunderstorms mentioned Graham and Janet decided to hire a car and drive down to New York State to visit their friends for a couple of nights.

As it is now 8pm here and we still can't see the shore they made a very good decision! We seem to have very stubborn fog which is showing no signs of lifting, even when the wind blows at 15 knots it doesn't seem to move.

If, and it's a big if, we get some good weather over the weekend we hope to at least go day sailing. We have all given up making plans and now taking every day as it comes!

Surfing Not Sailing!

We departed Newport, as planned at 9.30am yesterday morning. The forecast was for winds upto 25 knots from the South with scattered showers and thunderstorms. We were all so happy with the prospect of sailing again that a bit of rain didn't worry us. Our main course was west so with the wind forecast we were in for a great sail.

As we motored out of the Bay the visibility started to decrease rapidly and the wind started to gust up to 30 knots. As we neared the point the sea started to build and was certainly not like forecast! With a bit of current against us we were not going anywhere fast! We turned the radio on to listen for a new forecast and heard that the 25kts winds had now been upgraded to 40kt winds and right on queue we recorded a gust of 38kts with it steadily reading 32kts.

With this we decided that there were still things we hadn't seen and done in Newport and turned around! With the seas building we surfed our way back to Newport!


We were all so disappointed to be delayed yet again. We seem destined never to leave Newport. We were safely tied back upto our mooring buoy by 12.30pm and by early evening thick fog had rolled into the harbour limiting visibility to around 100 metres.

After listening to another forecast it was decided to wait till Thursday morning before making any more plans.

Ready to Cruise - Finally!

After several days of waiting, the Electrician arrived on Monday and spent six hours working with Colin to try and solve the problems with the inverter. As we expected it is not going to be easily or cheaply solved but having isloated it all we can at least go cruising for the rest of the week and sort it out after the owners leave next Monday.

As Graham and Janet only have 5 days left onboard we are going to try and make the most of their time and explore a bit of Connecticut and Long Island.

The plan is to leave Newport around 9.30am Wednesday morning and sail to Old Lyme on the Connecticut River, about 55nm away. We have a berth booked at a marina 2 miles down the river, for Wednesday and Thursday nights. A friend of the Owners is due to join us on Thursday and Friday so we will go out for day sails around Long Island Sound.

We have been given strict instructions to be moored or anchored close to a bar which will be showing the football on Saturday - no pressure! We are due back into Newport on Monday 3rd July in time for the Independence Day parties and fireworks on the 4th!

We have a berth booked in Newport Shipyard for the 3 weeks the Owners are away so that we can get some carpentry and electrical work done.

But before then we are just looking forward to sailing again and so we are keeping our fingers crossed that the weather is kind to us for the rest of the week.

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Weekend Washout

Unfortunately, we never got any nice weather on Sunday so the whole weekend was a complete was out. Luckily, with England due to play Football our Owners and Guests were happy to spend time ashore on Sunday and watch the match.

Our guests decided to leave a couple of hours earlier than planned and almost as soon as they had gone the weather started to clear!

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First Guests

Due to the problems with the Generator and Inverter we are still in Newport. However, the guests who were due to meet us in Long Island caught the train up here from New York to spend the weekend onboard. Unfortunately the weather is horrible with thick fog and torrential rain and it's not due to be much better on Sunday. Not ideal for a weekend of cruising!

After a difficult week our spirits were lifted yesterday when Mark and Kelly, friends from Palma, arrived in Newport, onboard the Oyster 66 they are running. We were lucky enough to catch up with them last night before our guests arrived.

The new heat exchanger for the generator arrived this morning and, due to the bad weather, the guests spent most of this afternoon ashore which gave Colin time to repair the generator and give it some TLC!

We are still waiting for the Electrician to come and work on the inverter. Everyday we are being told he is on his way only to be told that he is delayed and will come tomorrow.

With the genny up and running again we are all hoping for good weather tomorrow so we can go out for a day sail but the forecast does not look promising.

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One Step Forward, 5 Steps Back

Unfortunately, we are not having a good week so far. Our relaxing weekend off now seems a distant memory! Monday morning greeted us with the smell of a burnt out PC Board - the 220v inverter had cooked itself. Whilst looking into that problem the watermaker started to leak and fill up the bilge in the workshop. Then, the computers decided to freeze up and refused to work.

Last week when we arrived in Newport we never once imagined that the damaged vang would be the least of our worries!

Talking of the vang, we received it back from the hydraulic company yesterday. We managed to get it back onboard and in place without a drop of oil! All the seals have been replaced and it is like new!

All being well the inverter is due to be looked at tomorrow by a specialist. After buying a new, plug in keyboard and mouse we managed to get the computers and wireless keyboard up and running again last night and the workshop bilge is now lovely and clean!

But just when things were looking up the new heat exchanger for the generator arrived yesterday only for us to find that Northern Lights have sent us the wrong part.

So as you can see things are not going to plan and it now looks unlikely that we will be able to make it down to Long Island for the weekend as we need to have the Generator fully operational before going to sea.

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Our Cabin

In case any you were wondering what our cabin looks like, here is a picture! It is the Starboard forward guest cabin and we are lucky enough to be able to use it most of the time. When the Owner’s family and friends are onboard then we will move into the Crew Cabin.

Kite Flying

After working pretty much flat out for the last eight weeks, we have just enjoyed a long weekend break away from the Boat. We booked into a nice hotel here in Newport and managed to catch up on some well needed sleep and relaxation.

Yesterday we went for a very long walk, around 8 miles round trip, to a State Park where we flew Colin's new kite. By the time we got to the park the wind had started to drop off but there was still enough for the kite to pull us off our feet at times! We topped the day off by enjoying a lovely meal and bottle of red wine at a nice restaurant in town.

All being well we will be heading off to Long Island around Wednesday where we will meet up some of the Owners family and friends.

Vang Repairs

Unfortunately our timing in Newport wasn’t ideal as everyone here was gearing up to the start of the 100th Newport to Bermuda Race. When we started making calls to Hydraulic Companies to ask if they could have a look at our vang we were laughed at as they were all so busy!

Thankfully, our patience paid off and we managed to find a Rigging company, who are registered Navtec (vang make) agents and they agreed to collect the vang on Thursday, if we could take it off. Of course, we agreed as we didn’t think taking it off would be too difficult – how wrong were we!

After half a day of fighting with it we finally got the top pin out. We then just had to drain the hydraulic oil and release the pressure before taking the bottom pin out. Everything was going well until the vang fought back and the hydraulic line blew off, covering us all, including the Owners, in hydraulic oil. It was not a pretty sight. It also went all over the boat and we mean all over the boat! Just when we thought we were getting close to finishing for the day, we had to start washing the boat down, again and again!

We did manage to get the vang off and lowered it into the tender. The vang is about 12ft long and weighs about 80kg so it looked like the tender had sprouted a bowsprit! The hydraulic guys are hoping to have it back to us by early next week – fingers crossed.

Newport

We were lucky to have winds either on our beam or aft quarter for most of the way, allowing us to us to motor sail, with the genoa, all the way to Newport. Thankfully after the eventful start to our first trip, things calmed down and the final few days were nice and quiet. We even saw some whales in the distance and were visited by some playful dolphins.

With the help of the genoa pushing us along, aswell as the gulf stream we made great progress towards Newport and arrived safely at 10.45am on Monday 12th June – Kate’s Birthday!

We moored alongside at Newport Yachting Centre but with the price of dockage going up to $5 per foot, per night from the 15th, we only booked for 2 nights! We were cleared in through Customs & Immigration within 20 minutes of arriving and it must have been one of the easiest clearance procedures we’ve ever done!

The plan is to stay in Newport until we can get the vang repaired and some spare parts for the Generator. It is hoped we will be on our way again by the middle of next week.

Hydraulics - Can't Live With Them, Can't Live Without Them!

During the early hours of Thursday morning Kate heard a strange banging noise every time the boat rolled. She eventually ventured into the Lazerette to investigate, only for the noise to stop - typical! Whilst looking around the Lazerette Kate discovered what appeared to be oil on top of some boxes but couldn’t find it’s source. Later we both spent over an hour looking for the oil leak as well as the rattle. The rattle was easily solved as it turned out to be lazy gas bottle which was leaning over with each roll but the oil leak was more difficult.

We finally found what we thought was the problem but we needed daylight to test the hydraulic system properly so waited till dawn. When we came to gybe at around 8am we pulled the mainsheet in using the hydraulic winch and then checked the lazerette. Oil was spraying out of a nut as an o ring had split. To be safe we decided to bring the mainsail down to allow us to fix the problem without the added pressure of needing the mainsheet winch.

After we both spent several hours in the Lazerette we managed to stop the leak and tidy up some of the mess.

With winds gusting upto 30 knots at time we were sailing at 7-8kts under genoa alone so we decided to wait till the seas had died down a little before hoisting the main again.

With the afternoon came a bit of a break in the wind so we decided it was a good time to hoist the mainsail, only for the vang (the ram which holds the boom down) to fail. This caused the boom to swing around violently but with some quick work with the topping lift and various lines we managed to tame it and bring it back under control. The vang is controlled by hydraulics and pneumatics and it appeared that a seal had failed between the two.

Unfortunately this meant that we couldn’t use the mainsail for the rest of the trip and also meant the end of our trip to New York. We decided it would be better to sail to Newport, Rhode Island where we hoped we would have a good chance of getting the vang repaired.

First Fish!

We left Freeport, Grand Bahama around 9.30am on Wednesday 7th June. There was a steady 10-12 knots of wind so once we were clear of all the reefs, we hoisted the mainsail and pulled out the genoa. With the wind forecast to pick up, as well as it being our first proper sail, we decided to play it safe and put one reef in the mainsail. The main is very big and powerful and we were soon sailing along at 7 to 8kts. The wind then picked up to 15kts and we were storming along at 9kts. Colin set up the new Fishing Rod and hoped that he would be able to provide us with fresh fish for dinner.

As we settled in to our first day at sea on Moonraker, we were all very pleased with her performance and how well she sailed. With the wind picking up we decided to put a second reef in and with 18 to 20 kts of wind we were storming along at 10kts. You could almost feel the boat smiling!

Having watched the fishing rod all day with no luck Colin was just about to bring it in at sunset when the line ran. There was a shout of FISH and SLOW DOWN! Kate & Graham tried to slow Moonraker down which was harder than it sounds! She was sailing along quite happily, surfing down waves at upto 12kts. She had no plans of stopping! After putting the genoa away and easing the main we managed to slow down to around 5kts which gave Col a chance to reel in a 8kg Dorado. The smile on his face says it all!

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Bahamas

After leaving Fort Lauderdale at 7am yesterday we arrived in Freeport, Grand Bahama at 4.30pm after a quick trip across the Straits of Florida. Unfortunately there was no wind so we had to motor all the way but we were assisted by a couple of knots of current. We spent the night moored alongside at Bradford Marine Shipyard, although it looks more like a graveyard for boats. The place is full of wrecks and there is even a 140ft motor yacht on the hard which snapped into two pieces!

We are due to leave within the next hour for New York, where we should be arriving Monday or Tuesday next week.

Finally On Our Way!

After another unexpected delay over the weekend, due to US Customs, we are now finally ready to Fort Lauderdale tomorrow morning.

We are planning to leave around 7am and sail to Freeport in the Bahamas, which will take around 11hrs. We will spend the night there before leaving early on Wednesday morning to sail north. Due to the various delays the planned stop in Chesapeake Bay has been scrapped and we are now going to sail upto New York where we should be arriving on Monday 12th June.

We are all very excited about finally leaving and really looking forward to sailing into New York. We are due in on Kate's Birthday so it should be a day to remember!

After a day in New York we will then spend a couple of weeks cruising between Long Island and Newport, Rhode Island.

Almost Ready To Go

We've had a very busy week, which is why unfortunately the Blog has been neglected - sorry!

All being well we are hoping to leave Fort Lauderdale this weekend and do a day sail to the Bahamas (have to clear out of the USA for tax purposes) and then sail upto Chesapeake Bay, which will take about 4 days.
All the contractors finally finished today and the Owners arrived back onboard this afternoon. As you can see their Cabin is looking much better!

Yesterday, we took on 2000 litres of fuel, (pictured below), which only took 30 minutes. After spending up to four hours refuelling Aphrodite it made a nice change!

Everything is slowly coming together but as usual there is still plenty to do.

The plan is to sail to Deltaville, about a third of the way up Chesapeake Bay and spend about a week there. We will then sail upto Long Island where some of the Owners family will join us for a few days.

We have been onboard Moonraker for about 6 weeks now and although we sometimes don't feel like there is time to draw breath we are really enjoying it and can't wait to set off and start visiting new places.