After a brutal, non-stop 30 day passage from Hammerfest, Norway, the floating dock alongside Zwicker’s Wharf in Lunenburg was one of the most welcome sights I’ve ever experienced. Sailing westward across the far North Atlantic is definitely an upstream battle, trying to effectively leverage the winds of a conga line of low pressure systems moving west to east against me. There was a lot of upwind sailing, made all the more difficult because I lost two upper battens in my mainsail. With the sail reefed in the high winds so only the upper portion is in action, the bagged out sail without battens made for pathetic upwind performance. Upwind sailing was further aggravated by wind forecasts that had the wind direction wrong by 20 or 30 degrees. It’s hard to devise a workable upwind strategy with wind angles so wrong.

The forecast wind speeds and seas were similarly wrong: 20-25 kts in the forecast were, in reality, sustained 30-35 kts.  Two meter waves turned out to be 3 to 4 meter waves with short periods, rolling or slamming into the boat every 5 or 6 seconds, many crashing right over the entire deck giving the boat a saltwater bath. In the past I’ve described such conditions as “rough”. When I reluctantly went up the companionway into the cockpit to adjust sails, and looked out at the surging, windblown seas and felt the howling wind as they twisted and tilted the boat, especially in the pitch black of night, only one word came to mind to describe it: violent. It was like walking out the front door of your house into a full blown street riot.

Of the 30 days, I can count on one hand the number I would describe as having some pleasant sailing. Even the weather was dismal, almost always a solid overcast with very rare sunbreaks.  I remember one afternoon, though, when it was actually pleasant enough to sit in the cockpit with my daily finger of Chivas watching a pod of dolphins swim alongside for awhile. Surprising, because I was more than 500 nm from any land. Normally, you only see dolphins in coastal waters so I thought “where are these guys going?”  They had unusual colors – mainly brown with a muted white stripe on their sides. I should have gotten sea bird and marine wildlife books for the boat long ago so I had some idea what I was looking at. Normally, I’m an astute observer. I can almost always tell when the dinosaurs in a movie are fake.

In addition to the lost mainsail battens, sometime in the last few days before arriving in Lunenburg the VHF radio antenna at the top of my mast blew away. I don’t need to use the VHF marine radio much, but that antenna is also used for the AIS system. The AIS system broadcasts my boat’s position, course, and speed, among other information, so other boats know where I am and where I’m going. Similarly, other boats  broadcast the same information so I know what they’re doing. The AIS receiver automatically takes this information and calculates how close ships may come to others, and whether there is a risk of a collision. I regard it as a mission-critical system, especially in busy waterways. With the antenna gone the system was inop and I was blind to nearby ships. I had to get a replacement antenna installed before leaving Lunenburg. Unfortunately, the 3 1/2 days I spent there were largely occupied with buying a replacement antenna and finding a rigger to climb the mast to install it. Even though Lunenburg is mainly a tourist town, in fact, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, I was surprised to find a marine electronics shop that could order anything, like an antenna and fittings, and have them arrive the next day. There was also a rigger in town; I thought I’d have to go to Halifax an hour away to find a rigger. 

I got the replacement antenna installed pretty efficiently given where I was, but it meant I had little time in explore and enjoy Nova Scotia. I certainly made the most of the variety of restaurants within a short walk of my boat. Scallops are a thing here: scallop PoBoy’s, scallops wrapped in bacon, grilled scallops on risotto, etc. A very welcome break from my boat food, I ate it all.

My destination is Annapolis, MD, still about 700 nm away with a  seriously bad looking weather system, perhaps a tropical depression moving north, in the long term forecast standing in my way. I may have to make the remaining passage to Annapolis a multi-hop process as I deal with that looming weather system.

Torn batten sleave and broken end cap