Yacht Delivery Blog

We popped out the bottom of the Tuamotus late last night and now have a relatively clear run to Tahiti, aside from one more small island. The wind is directly behind us, but it's not quite strong enough for us to move as fast as I'd like, so we're using the engine to help our speed. Our estimated time of arrival (ETA) in Tahiti is very early Friday morning, so we'll sit off the coast for a few hours until daylight and then head in. Remember the old sailor's saying, "All the wrecks are on the rocks" and "Another night at sea never unalived anyone"? That advice holds true for navigating the pass into the marina area, which is definitely not a place to enter at night unless you were born there. This trip has been extraordinary, taking us on a journey that's probably only completed by a few hundred people a year. And almost non would do what we have done and sail so far in one go. It's around 4,600 nautical miles from Panama to Tahiti, and wh...

Yesterday, we motored all day and most of the night in flat calm conditions. Then, at 2:57 AM, it was as if a wind switch was flipped, and the wind started blowing 35-40 knots. The wind angle is around 90 degrees, not quite as easterly as I expected. We had the deeply furled headsail up until now, and at 7:00 AM, the wind is slowly dropping to around 30 knots. When Adam gets up in a couple of hours, we'll pull up the reefed main and get this show on the road! I'm eagerly waiting for the GRIB s to be updated, but I don't expect the wind to go above 30 knots now. We've had one or two monstrous waves into the cockpit, but Namarie can handle it. It seems like Namarie and I have something in common: after the last 40-knot winds on our way to Panama, we both felt we had proven ourselves and didn't need to do it again. Yet, here we are. With years of experience in the yacht delivery industry, Yacht Delivery Solutions is your trusted partner for safe and reliable transpo...

We're keeping a close eye on the weather forecast and preparing for a bit of a blow. The GRIBs all suggest that the wind will be southeasterly, which should make for a fast ride over the final 1000 nautical miles and perhaps we can smash the 200nm a day record. We're still on track to turn west by tonight and catch the wind starting to blow first thing tomorrow and bring it over the port quarter. The weather at the moment is fantastic, with clear skies, a few fluffy clouds, and 10-14 knots of breeze. There's no sign of what's coming around the corner. We're motor sailing to make as many miles as possible, which goes against my sailor instincts, but we're gaining around 30 nautical miles a day with the engine running. Yesterday evening, I found myself being hoisted up the mast again, an activity that's never pleasant, even in the safety of a marina. But at sea, with a partially raised mainsail swaying above me, the task becomes even more daunting. The upcomin...

Yesterday was a fantastic day, a stark contrast to the first three quarters of the trip. The wind wasn't quite as strong as I would have liked during the night, but the sea was flat, the sky was completely clear, and Venus was shining brightly during the sunset. As the sunset progressed and evening set in, all the other stars appeared, with Orion behind us and the Milky Way, the galaxy we are in, sparkling across the sky. Late yesterday morning, we decided to pull up the gennaker, even though it seemed like we were tempting fate after such a successful day. The sock isn't long enough to contain the gennaker, which was already trying to escape. With everything set up and ready to go, Adam stood by on the sheet while I started to pull up the sock. (I am not sure what you call the fiberglass 'funnel' on the base of the sock but it has already been a problem and fell off a few times. I thought it had been fixed with several cable ties. It looks like a shoe horn so we will c...

Now I'm under a personal gag order to avoid discussing the "watery wingsuiters." I've been racking my brain for a different topic, but it seems that once you've covered weather, waves, and oceanic aviators, there's not much else to write about. Yesterday, we put the clocks back another hour, so the sun was just lighting up the sky when I got up for my watch this morning. It's definitely a cheerier experience than waking up to pitch black until 7 AM. If we adjust the clocks again in a few days, Adam can also enjoy a sunrise, and we can arrive in Tahiti without being too out of sync with local time, and our body clocks won't be too disoriented. We spent yesterday motor sailing with light winds from around 120 degrees. We had the main, headsail, and a Volvo pushing us westwards with 10-14 knots of apparent wind. During the night, the wind died down to 8 knots apparent, so we dropped the main and continued with just the headsail until very early morning wh...

We’ve made great time yesterday, with an average 24-hour run that will be over 150 nautical miles, I will need to check at midday. We had a nice breeze for most of the day, steadily sitting at around 7.5 knots with 12-14 knots of breeze on the beam. The wind died off during the evening, so we dropped the sails and carried on motoring. There were a lot of fishing boats last night, not compared to Asian standards, but we could see six or eight at once, which seems like a lot for the Pacific. Presumably, they're local boats from the Galapagos. They had no AIS or visible navigation lights other than large white lights they used for fishing. I woke up for my watch just before sunrise, and Adam handed over to me and went to bed. I did a quick check of the instruments and surroundings before putting the kettle on. I then followed with my usual morning routine of chanting internally “COME ON!!! WHYS IT TAKING SO LONG????!! HURRY UP!!!” while staring at the kettle. Standing in the galley lo...

With only 100 nautical miles to go until we arrive at Puerto Ayora, a town in central Galápagos, we’ve started to slow down to time our arrival for first light tomorrow morning. I’ve already been in touch with the agent to begin the formalities for clearing in and ordering fuel. Yet again, Starlink proves to be an absolute game-changer for this kind of thing.  Believe it or not, I finally had to put on a long-sleeve top last night! It seems to be getting colder the closer we get to the equator! It remains completely overcast and drizzling, so it's no surprise the seabirds have decided to hitch a ride.Their preferred place to relax seems to be the worst spot on the boat. They like being right at the front where the motion is strongest and then stand on the lifelines, which are 6mm stainless steel wire. It looks exhausting trying to hang on with webbed feet, getting covered in spray, and trying to balance while you’re asleep. They must know something I don’t. Perhaps they know if the...

The wind, it seems, has a mind of its own. Yesterday, it decided to veer a little further east and weaken considerably, making it practically useless for our purposes. Not wanting to dawdle any longer than necessary, we've made a strategic course correction. We've fired up the engine and are now heading at 260 degrees – 10 degrees south of our original path, but still aiming slightly north of Trinidad. Our hope is to catch some northerly winds as we progress. If not, well, there's no harm done. However, the weather forecasts aren't exactly optimistic on that front. The good news is that even with the weak apparent wind hovering around 7 knots, it's still giving us a gentle push. We're maintaining a steady 6 knots at 1800 RPM, and fuel consumption is very economical at around 3.7 liters per hour. So, even though the sails aren't doing much billowing at the moment, we're still making good progress. Our range with this engine efficiency is huge – around...

We had a record night last night, getting AIS signals from vessels that were as much as 115 nm away. That's a lot farther than the typical range of 15-20 nm for an AIS-receiver. It must be due to some atmospheric phenomenon.  As we sail along the coast of Java, we can see the distant glow of fishing boats off to our starboard side. They are everywhere, like a swarm of fireflies on the horizon. I can't quite make out the individual lights, but we sailed past them all night, so I'm going to say there were at least 200. It's sad to think that they are fishing with no regulations or restrictions, depleting the marine life and harming the ecosystem. 6500 nm seemed an almost impossible distance to sail when we left NZ, but now we have only 1500 nm left as we keep chipping away at the miles. I'm guessing we'll reach Sabang in 9 days, clear out in 2 days, and then head to Phuket in another 2 days. That's exciting.  The wind has been up and down for the last 24 hours...

Marina Del Ray was actually named after a guy called Ray who is the owner. Yes, that's right, it's literally Marina of Ray. How hilarious is that? Anyway, we had a nice time there catching up on some sleep. You know how it is when you sail for a long time, you get used to the watch cycles and you wake up every few hours. It was great to have a few uninterrupted night's but after sailing for long the watch cycles have become a habit so we'd still wake up occasionally. We also managed to get some projects done on the boat, like fixing the rudder that was giving us some trouble. I came up with a very high tech solution involving 2 blocks of wood. Don't worry, it's totally safe and reliable. Trust me, I'm a professional. Besides the rudder, we also worked on some other things, like changing the oil in the engines, changing the filters, checking the rigging, and topping up the water tanks. Nothing too exciting, but necessary to keep the boat in good shape. Like w...

We are now looking forward to reaching our destination which is in sight. We expect to arrive at the west tip of Lombok around 9 am, and then it's just a few hours further to a secure mooring. We can't wait to get some rest and relaxation after this trip. The wind has been light and variable for the last few days, which means sailing was slow and frustrating so we've done a fair bit of motoring. One of the most curious things we have encountered is the mysterious appearance and disappearance of fishing boats in this area. Yesterday, during the day, we sailed for hours without seeing a single vessel on the horizon. We thought we had the sea to ourselves, enjoying the calm and quiet. But as soon as the sun set, things changed dramatically. Within minutes, we spotted seven fishing boats around us, all with bright lights and presumably nets or lines. We wondered where they came from and what they were doing. We tried to keep a safe distance from them, but they seemed to multipl...

Today was a slow day, as we had to sail in zig zags. You see, heading directly to our destination would have the wind at 180 degrees, which is inefficient and dangerous. That's when the wind is blowing straight from behind, and the sail can flop from one side to the other without warning. This is called an accidental gybe, and it can damage the rigging or injure someone.  So, we kept the wind at 150 degrees, which means the apparent wind is higher and there is less chance of an accidental gybe. The apparent wind is the wind that we feel on board, which is a combination of the true wind and the boat speed. The faster we go, the more wind we create, and the more power we get from the sail. Unfortunately, this also means that we are not sailing in a straight line to our destination, but rather in a zig zag pattern.  It's almost flat calm now, and we have been motoring for the last few hours. The engine is humming along, and we are hoping for some breeze to fill our sails again. T...

Sailing in the trade winds is a dream come true for sailors. These are the steady winds that blow from east to west near the equator, creating ideal sailing conditions for trade ships for centuries. But for a sailor who promised to write daily updates for this blog, trade winds are not a subject matter that has much variation. The days are mostly the same, with nothing but blue sky and water in sight. It's probably a better experience for Rhona as she's lucky enough to have me all to herself. The only excitement we had yesterday was when the wind shifted twice, forcing us to gybe and change course. And last night, we had to turn on the engine for a few hours as the wind died down completely. I hope you don't mind these reports, but that's the reality of sailing in the trade winds. Maybe tomorrow will bring something more adventurous. Or maybe not. I actually prefer it when it's not exciting, because excitement usually means something is going wrong or about to go wr...

I’m happy to report that we have finally made it through the Torres Strait, It was not an easy feat, but we managed to do it with some luck and skill!  The last section of the strait is extremely narrow and shallow, with many reefs and islands to avoid. I had been concerned about getting through in daylight, as the visibility is crucial for spotting the hazards. I had considered anchoring for the night, but eventually decided to push on and we made it into clear water before sunset, leaving just a couple of shoals to navigate through into open water. Generally, I would be very cautious of a 9-meter patch, but when the rest of the depth is 13 meters, it doesn’t seem too bad. Of course, the strait is not the only danger we faced on this voyage. Since I have so far been attacked by birds and several vicious flying fish, I am very cautious of what nature can throw at you. After reading today a catamaran that was sailing from Vanuatu to Australia sank after being attacked by sharks I h...

We had a nice second day with reasonable wind and we made good miles as we approached the Torres Strait , the narrow passage between Australia and Papua New Guinea that connects the Coral Sea and the Arafura Sea. This is one of the most challenging and exciting parts of our trip, as we have to navigate through a complex maze of reefs, islands, sandbanks, and shipping lanes. We also saw more dolphins at once than I've seen for a long time and interestingly there were two different types of dolphins swimming together. This is the point my marine biology skills breakdown but there were some very large ones and dozens of smaller ones. I think the large ones were bottlenose dolphins, which are very common in this area. They are friendly and curious animals that often come close to boats and play in the bow waves. No idea what the small ones where other than that they weren't spinner dolphins.  We dodged a few ships and entered the Torres Strait just about sunset and hav...

The wind has been unpredictable, ranging from 2 to 32 knots and shifting around during the day and it's been sitting at 30 most of the night. The weather has been a mix of sunshine and rain, making for an interesting 24hrs. Despite being only 16 degrees south of the equator, it's still not as warm as I expected.  At one point, a ship came within half a mile of us. Before AIS, a ship heading towards us would have meant a lot of drama. We would have to estimate its course with binoculars , and to constantly check the bearings and decide if we should change course to avoid a collision. Now, we have all that information displayed on the chart plotter from 20 nautical miles away. Half a mile might not seem like much, but at sea it's considered a very close encounter.  Before we had chart plotters "back in the day" we occasionally had to navigate with charts which were photocopies of photocopies and were so degraded that they had holes in them. We had no idea what was ...

We have been sailing for 5 - or 6? - days now from Port Vila to Port Moresby, and today was the most challenging one so far. The wind has been blowing at 30 knots all day, creating a couple of huge waves. Around noon, a massive wave picked up the boat and spun it around like a toy. Everything flew across the cabin, and all the alarms went off for bilge pumps, off course alarm and auto pilot off course. Luckily, nothing was broken, and no one was hurt. It's hard to believe that a mere 30 knots could create such mayhem. The wind and waves have eased off now, and we are back on track. Our daily run was 164 nautical miles, which is great considering the conditions. We are making good progress and hope to reach Port Moresby in a few more days.  We even saw about a hundred birds circling around which is reassuring as presumably they were hunting fish. Though I am going to guess the fish are not in commercial quantities which is why we don't see fishing boats.