I probably should’ve written this at the time of leaving or made a few notes at the time, but truth be told it was wild..
The stress was high, the time was limited and 2 weeks before myself and 3 crew volunteers were to leave across the ocean my wife and kids decided to do the crossing with us. Honestly that decision brought a massive amount of concern to me. You see if things were to go wrong and it was myself and 3 others I was pretty sure we would be able to handle any situation but throw my wife and 2 kids into that equation and my tummy starts to turn.
Kim made the decision to cross on the boat rather than fly to the UK and fly to the Caribbean from there partly because she really wanted to be a part of the adventure and partly because she was concerned about being stuck in the UK if a “potential” lockdown forced them to stay there, which in hindsight it would’ve.
I had spent almost an entire year upgrading and prepping the boat with everything from installing a watermaker / desalinator to upgrading the house bank to lithium ion (LifePO4) as well as upgrading the electronics and servicing and checking everything that moves.
Everything moved pretty slowly until the last week. We berthed Caribbean Soul at Port Owen all year because working on a dock is just so easy and then moved to Saldanha towards the end. The sailing in Saldanha is incredible and we were long time club members so a familiar atmosphere was always refreshing.
We checked out on the Monday and had to wait a day for the weather to change as we would be leaving just after a soft cold front (northerly system) was ending and we would be sailing just in front of a predicted southerly gale.
To describe the emotions of sailing out of the bay and leaving your country to the wide open ocean is almost impossible. I had said goodbye to my parents the day before and there were many tears all round.
Kim and the kids seemed far more grounded emotionally and were ready to take on the challenge. This wasn’t the first time I had left my home for a long period of time and despite the overwhelming problems South Africa has I am truly African and knew from the past that this hole would never truly be filled until I returned.
We set off to the best sailing on the South African coast you could ever want for the first 2 days. Very calm seas and warm winds slightly forward of the beam. Tyrone (One of the crew) master racing enthusiast set our sails just perfectly and we managed a solid 7 plus knots of boat speed in 10-12 knots of wind.
We left with 4 boats all at the same time, hearts beating and open horizens. We stayed in radio contact for as long as we could but by the 3rd night we were so far apart.
The wind change off the coast from Northerly to Southerly was pretty dramatic and all crew were on deck most of the night with very little sleep. The seas also became very uncomfortable and confused. Nothing like I expected and not pleasing to to be in.
I was pretty seasick for a good week from this point and struggled to do the smallest of jobs. Night shift was always the toughest because it was still very cold at night even though at this point we were well north of Namibia and pretty deep off the coast.
Disaster struck one morning as I did my usual checks and when looking at the water tanks saw them empty. I wiped my eyes and tapped on the gauges but it was still there. 3 empty water tanks. I woke the crew and we opened the floorboards and peered inside. Nothing, no more water. Here we are in the absolute middle of the ocean and had no more water in our tanks. How could this happen?
I did a system check and couldnt find the cuplrit. I then traced the water lines and found the demon. Our hot water heater had a blow off valve to release hot water /steam in a situation where the pressure was too intense.
That valve had been permanently shut by a previous technician for God knows what reason and caused the actual valve to crack open. So during the night while motoring all our fresh water was leaking into the engine compartment and then was being evacuated by the engine room bilge pump…
What did we do… Well as mentioned before we had a water maker on board I started making water. We made water constantly for 5 days and eventually filled up our tanks. We were on water rations much to the dismay of some crew but I needed to be sure we were going to be ok.
The crew was getting into a rhythm but I was certain lacking the fun factor. Others were doing much better and Kim who always got horribly seasick in the slightest bump was doing fine. This added nothing to my confidence and looking back I think it was more emotional than anything. I left a great e-comm business which I started mid-year, I left my parents who I care for deeply and I left a very comfortable life for a completely unknown outcome.
We were about 10 days in and 4 days away from our first stop St Helena and everyone was ready for land. The sea started evening out and we were now in the trades. It was definitely warming up but not shorts and T-shirt weather yet…
What did we do with our time? Well I slept as much as I could off-shift. Kai and Azura had the best time playing games all day on phones as well as talking and playing games with Kim and crew in the cockpit. It wasn’t the time I expected after watching many YouTube channels and preparing myself for having time to kill and just chilling / reading.
We did have a few days of great weather and sailing and we fished, swam and even made a braai. This quickly made up for the lows I faced at the start and we gathered speed for our first island stop – St Helena
As we inched closer to St Helena the days grew longer. I remember at one point thinking we would miss the island completely after being surrounded by so much blue ocean we suddenly had to make landfall on a tiny dot in the middle of sea…
I’ll never forget that feeling. Land Ho! Seeing land after 14 days at sea. so exciting for everyone and we were imagining what this island was about, what it had to offer and of course the festive season coming up spending our first New years and Xmas on Caribbean Soul. Our new floating home…
