Sailing Vessel Beruta Ship's Log
Darwin, Australia - Pointe des Galets, Reunion
Monday 28 August 2023
A night before departure was supposed to be windy but it wasn't. Nevertheless, it calmed down later than usual and around 3AM it had already started to blow. Not strong though. The forecast predicted gusts to 20 kts but it was less than 15. I didn't sleep good because was worried about pulling my anchor in the morning against a strong wind. I stretched my back few days ago when I was doing my yoga, and it hadn't fully recovered yet.
I had lifted my dinghy and stowed it on a bow Sunday morning. It did fit giving just a tiny space to work with an anchor or fore sails and around the mast. Nothing was perfect but at least I hoped that it was a better arrangement than towing it behind across Indian ocean for almost 40 days.
Provisioning was done in 3 trips on a bicycle to Woolworth supermarket. I had moved Beruta from the Fannie Bay anchorage to the downtown one.
Authorities in Darwin need to improve the setup for visiting yachts, and they may learn it from French territories. Neither Fannie Bay nor downtown anchorages are equipped with dinghy docks. In the Fannie Bay people just leave their dinghies anchored off the beach but given 5-7 m tides, it is not easy. Often you need to drag your dinghy a long way to the water or get into the water to bring it ashore. And water is not too safe because of a deadly cube jellyfish. In downtown, I was tying my Maxxon to a floating pontoon near the loading-only side. The other side is occupied by a catamaran and scooters, whose owners do not allow using their docks.
Water is another problem. There is no public water in Darwin! You are at a mercy of other people. I filled my tank twice from the Cullen Bay pontoon. The first time a gardener Merry opened a vandal-proof tap for me. The second time I did it myself after I bought the key at Bunnings. If you ask a lockmaster about water, you may get a different answer depending on who is on duty that day. One could send you to look for Merry, another might just tell you that there is no water at the pontoon.
Spare parts and other stuff for a boat is hard to find in Darwin. I ended up ordering most of them online. At least I was able to open a parcel collect account in a local post office in Parap, suburb of Darwin facing Fannie Bay.
Overall, I was not too pleased with Darwin. Australian Border Force was free, nice and efficient but biosecurity would cost you about $500 to clear in. Moreover, it was the only port of entry in NT (Northern Territories). The next one was far away on the west coast - Perth.
I woke up when it was still dark, did my morning exercises and began pulling the anchor out, cleaning the chain with a brushstick. I had to use the engine to break the anchor from a mud bottom.
I waved farewell to Brian, my neighbour, ex-United Airlines pilot, who would sail to Shri-Lanka in a couple of days on his Time Drifter sailboat (if I remember the boat name correctly).
At 7:30 I was already near the entrance of Cullen Bay. I played by the rules and called the lockmaster on VHF 11 asking for permission to come to the pontoon. I said that my appointment with ABF was at 9:00, one hour earlier than it was in reality. He said that I need to wait outside till 9 then. When I added that I needed water and fuel as well, he allowed me to come 30 minutes earlier, meaning that I still need to spend an hour somewhere. He mentioned that there was no water at the pontoon. When I said that I was given water before here and that I could not leave without water, he said that he would do something for me.
I didn't want to anchor and decided to circle in front of the marina. There were few boats on the nearby anchorage. I had a conversation with one of them. While I was rounding his boat, three ARC racing boats went to the pontoon and one more was coming.
I was afraid that when my time comes, there would be no room for me. So I came to the pontoon at 8:00. The other boat came right after mine and there was no more room left.
I quickly got my hose and filled my water tank. I had made sure that my key worked two days before, when I cycled to the marina. When I was filling my three new jerry cans with the diesel, an ABF officer came and said that they would check me out earlier because more boats were coming. I just asked them for 15 minutes to check the wheel on my log meter. I had cleaned it a day before but for some reason it was showing me half of my real speed through water. I replaced it with a blank insert in a throughhull, cleaned the wheel and its axis again and put it back. It happened to be working normally later.
ABF were quick. They gave me a paper for Reunion and some information in case I decide to make a stop on Christmas or Cacos/Keelings Islands. They also "bribed" me with little souvenirs to report any unusual activity at sea, like floating objects and boat-to-boat exchanges. On my comment about "bribes" they replied that it was the opposite. I suppose when some values go from officials to a civilian and not the other way around, it is not a bribe.
At 9:30 I was already leaving Darwin. The wind was good. I set my main with a single reef and later took another one.
I had my late breakfast eating cottage cheese with a Greek style yogurt and some pastries. Then I spent some time fixing new bugs in my navigation software. While I was in Darwin, I finished AIS collision calculation and graphing as well as I added GRIB data processing to compare forecasted data with the observed, and also to display a future weather; say, a 6-hour forecast in my future position.
The observed data is shown first and in parentheses the predicted numbers are given. In a case of wind, the speed and the direction are adjusted as apparent, so it is easy to compare. The second pair of parentheses shows the observed range (min - max). Now I can tell you precisely how accurate the forecast has been.
Afternoon the wind became light, and I was broad reaching with my genoa. At the sunset the wind died. I motored for 4 hours, then I got 15 kts of wind at 40° on starboard. I raised my genoa and half, then two-thirds of the main. The wind lasted for a couple of hours and then it became still.
I started my engine, hoping that it would blow again by the morning.
Tuesday 29 August 2023
Contrary to my expectations, there was no wind. I spotted a yellow-and-black stripped snake and some other creatures, which looked like tiny turtles or perhaps, squids on a mirror-like ocean surface. There was also lots of plankton.
A received new weather forecast told me that my Starlink with the enabled priority data at $3.68 per GB on top of the $200 NZD a month roaming package, worked. It also told me that I would need to motor for at least 2 or even 3 days! That was terrible but I expected it. In this part of Timor sea, it is always calm.
In the afternoon there was a light wind 40° on the portside. I was motorsailing under full sails a bit making an extra knot. Before the sunset, the wind increased to 8-10 kts, and I finally stopped the engine. Though the wind shifted to the west, I continued to sail 20° of course in a hope that it would change a direction later. It was such a pleasure moving under the sails - gentle and quiet.
I rotated an engine air filter to avoid burning a hole in it, and I drained water from the fuel prefilter. The engine was ready to run again when the wind dies.
Wednesday 30 August 2023
The salmon that I had bought in a superstore and barbecued before leaving, was now gone. So it was time to fish. And fish there was!
I had been reading J. Cook Journal of his first voyage, when I finally spotted it. It was planing on a surface like mahi-mahi but it was too shallow for it to be the one. When I brought it closer, I recognized a tuna but why there was no resistance? Small tuna? The puzzle was revealed when I got it aboard without a fishing hook. There was only half of a large tuna, and so it was already dead. Who did eat the other half? It must have been a big fish: either a shark or perhaps, a marlin. Could it be also even a bigger tuna? Or a dolphin?
In any case, I was happy that I didn't have to fight it and clean the cockpit afterwards. It fitted my empty freezer nicely, leaving room for another fish. An easy catch, almost like going to a fish market.
Sashimi was in due course. The same recipe but a new name - sashimi a la Timor: salt, pepper, vinegar, lime juice and onion. Tuna was optional. Rum was not. In this windless weather, 35° C in the cabin was too hot. In the cockpit, a mixture of a breeze with rum was barely enough to survive the heat.
The second dish was a fish soup, for which I usually use a fish head and a tail. In this case there was just the former and it did not fit the pot. I had to take it apart using a pocket knife as nobody around wanted to lend me an axe.
The rest of the day was spent chatting with friends. A new age! Thanks E. Mask and windless conditions (plenty of power from the 80 amp alternator). This meant no more lonely voyages in a future! It was a bit unusual though to have a high speed internet in a middle of an ocean. Well, ok, not in the middle yet but certainly far from a shore.
Thursday 31 August 2023
This was a third continuous day without a wind. At night, I tried to set sails twice. The first time they only lasted less than an hour. The second time a bit longer.
In the morning I pumped 4 jerry cans of diesel into my fuel tank meaning that on average I spent two cans per day motoring almost all the time.
At lunch, I noticed a third sea snake. This time it was a different kind. It was larger and had different colors: more like a brown with light spots.
And at the evening when I was approaching an oil field at the border of a continental shelf, dolphins came. I should have said that Beruta came to their habitat instead. I thought they lived here all the time along with numerous birds. 
One tanker was close to a rig and another one was anchored not far away.
I should have mentioned that while I was in Darwin, I replaced a chartplotter with a used one that I ordered from US. A seller had stated that it was fully functioning unit with a brand new 3D-printed uni-control. It even had come with a 3-month warranty. In practice NMEA port 1 did not work and it was needed for my navigational software to work. So I had to use the main CPU unit of mine, which also preserved all my tracks. But a screen was like new, the uni-control worked fine and even the memory card door was intact, not to mention mounting holes. All those components were broken in mine chartplotter.
All in all, I was happy to restore this part of my navigation equipment even despite the seller not responding to my complaint about the failed communication port. And I ordered two empty memory cards from Navionics to download African and new Caribbean charts.
Another important item to repair was an autopilot drive Q047, which was broken in half by a huge mahi-mahi fallen on it during my voyage from Noumea to Darwin. Initially, I had ordered a new one from a third-party but later I also sent the broken unit to Raymarine service center for a repair, and they returned a brand-new autopilot at half the price of the one that I bought. Oh, well, at least now I had three drives!
For a Yanmar engine I ordered a spare alternator and a starter. Besides replacing oil and a filter, I had to replace belts (a salt-water pump belt was almost gone) and out of precaution - a salt-water pump impeller.
I repaired my main sail too. Grommets that I had bought in Fiji, #2, were too big and did not fit the holes in the sail. I ordered #1 online and a new die tool but the grommets were too shallow for the sickness of the sail and a tape that held a slide. I made a couple of trips to Nautical Supplies and got slightly deeper grommets. Unfortunately, the die tool was of a bad type, it was straight instead of a cone shape and did not work alone. I had to cycle to Total Tools and buy some punches that I used in combination with my die set. The end result was satisfactory. Alternatively, I could have brought the main to the sailloft in Nautical Supplies and use their die set. If I had brought my main to them when I came to Darwin, they could have fixed it in a week, including minor repairs in other parts of the sail that I had to do myself manually stitching over existing holes. The problem was that when I called Nautical Supplies, I was told that the sailloft was too busy.
The idea to buy a watermaker turned out to be super expensive: from $7,500 to $12,000 AUD. I thought I should have just made it myself when I had more time if I really needed it.
Friday 1 September 2023
Early morning I was motorsailing by Cartier Islet on the south-east side of Ashmore Reef. The reef, which is a natural reserve and marine protected area, might have been an interesting place to make a stop. CMAP93 chart notes says that yachts are allowed to anchor in the western lagoon close to West Island and may go ashore there. It says that there is a fresh water well on the island. Fishing for immediate consumption is also allowed in that lagoon. The latest Navionics and iSailor charts say that no entry is allowed except for aboriginal people.
I stopped the engine in the morning and attempted to reach west making 2 to 4 kts in 4 to 7 kts wind. Afternoon, the wind became easterly and the only way to continue sailing was to sail north in a hope to find better winds above 12 latitude south, closer to Indonesian islands.
One has to sail north in order to sail south - this is the irony of Timor Sea. Attempting to sail south straight from Darwin, would probably mean a much longer distance without wind because the route would follow the Australian coast, which stops the wind. A sailboat could possibly get away by going south close to a shore and use sea and land breezes but a captain and a crew should be prepared to tack or sail close haul at night. Sailing west along or above 12 latitude S a half distance to Christmas Island from Darwin, would get a sailor far enough from Australia to finally turn south. Obviously, it is longer but if a fuel is limited, then it is the way to go. People going to South Asia or Suez Canal are in a better position leaving Darwin.
Saturday 2 September 2023
All these theoretical thoughts backed by weather forecasts did not stand. The reality was cruel - there was still no wind for the fourth day! When I said "no wind", I meant no sailable apparent wind. It was following and below 5 kts. The latest weather forecast was inaccurate. I attempted to set sails few times. The first time in the morning the main worked for less than an hour. The second time after lunch while I was still thinking about a possibility to hoist it, the wind died. The third time in the evening it finally worked. The wind was still very weak and variable, 6-8 kts, 120-180° on portside. The mainsail flapped loudly most of the night because of rolling. I was worried about its integrity as well as the integrity of the mast and rigging because of those wild sudden jerks caused by the sail flapping.
Anticipating this weather, I had changed the course to Christmas Island. It was still about 1,000 miles away. I decided to make my mind tomorrow. If there were still no wind, then I would have continued motoring to Christmas Island. I would have fuel for another 2 to 3 days and then it should be good wind all the way to the island. On the other hand, if there were some wind tomorrow, then I could have changed the course back to Reunion and would have had just enough fuel to charge the batteries running an engine a couple of hours every day.
In the evening I made a reinforcement of an improvised autopilot bracket. The original one was broken by mahi-mahi on my way to Darwin. Having being attached to the cockpit by just two screws, it started to move back and forth when the tiller drive was engaged.
Sunday 3 September 2023
Still sailing under the full mainsail. The wind became a bit more stable, and the sail flapping reduced. I looked at the forecast and decided to continue on course 270° M for a bit longer, either till the evening or even tomorrow before changing the course to a few degrees south. Turning south immediately, I could have ended in a no wind area again.
After breakfast, I pumped three jerry cans into a fuel tank. It now had 110L and I still had 40L in jerry cans. I calculated 100L for battery charging. 50L were a spare diesel for occasional motoring and entering Pointe des Galets harbour.
Afternoon, somehow I got confidence that I would reach Reunion without stopping at Christmas Island. I built a great circle route to it from my current position and changed the course to 252° M.
For a couple of days the difference would not be big, so I could still turn to Christmas Island if necessary.
Last thing for Sunday was to take a good shower.
Monday 4 September 2023
I didn't have a good sleep though. Fishing vessels had no AIS but very bright white lights. I followed a couple of them for few hours changing my course by 10 degrees to the starboard until they finally turned around and disappeared. There was a third one in front of me but I lost her sight behind the horizon and was afraid that she could make a turn too. I was waking often to look around but saw nothing.
In a day the wind calmed down below 10 kts and shifted to the back. The genoa stopped working and had to be brought down. I sailed under the full main until the afternoon when the wind did the opposite: shifted forward and later increased to 12-13 kts. The genoa was reinstated and two reefs were taken on the main in the evening. Last night I had sailed with a single reef and it had been too fast, close to 7 kts. It was still fast because of reaching under the genoa, around and above 6 kts.
The 24-hour progress was not very impressive though because I was still under an influence of Australian tidal currents. They were often stronger than 1 knt.
I added one block on each side for the preventer line, so it was less chafing of the dinghy and a boat superstructure. If I find another line of a suitable length, I would also replace the block at the bow with a double one and have two preventer lines, so that I do not have to re-route it from one side to the other every time I gybe.
Tuesday 5 September 2023
The weather pattern repeated. I followed it in terms of lowering the genoa and unreefing the main in the morning and reversing it in the evening.
The new forecast made me sad as from Thursday, there would be light and variable wind for the next three to five days! Not that it was great today but it was sailable at a low speed with some flapping of the main.
Just to give me a little hope, at night the wind increased initially to 15 kts, which forced me to take two reefs on main, and then to over 20 kts! The genoa went down. Too much load on everything at 7.5 kt speed.
Not to spoil me, the wind also shifted forward. Beruta was sailing at 70° to the wind. Waves increased, and I had almost no sleep, rolling in my bed and listening to all the noises different objects created in the cabin.
Wednesday 6 September 2023
By the morning, the wind became lighter, 10-15 kts and I hoisted the genoa keeping two reefs on the main. According to the forecast, I had just 24 hours of wind before it dies.
I even skipped charging the batteries hoping to run the engine for 4 hours tomorrow when it calms down.
Around noon, I passed 1,000 nm. 3,400 was left to Reunion.
Sometimes it takes almost half an hour to connect to Starlink at sea. Today it was taking close to that, when at the end the app said "Disconnected" and the 12v-to-48v up-converter had no green LED light. It was hot and the cigarette lighter plug was also very hot. I was surprised as I didn't notice it in the past. The worst thing could be that something was burned: the dish or the power supply. I had less powerful DC power supply (60W) as a spare, which I thought was not enough for the dish. As a last resort, I could have restored the original 220V Starlink power supply that was built in a Wi-Fi router.
I turned the dish off hoping that it had been just the thermal or over-the-current protection and decided to let it cool down first. After lunch, I took the cigarette lighter plug apart and found a blown 25A fuse. At the same time, 16A breaker for this circuit on a panel was not triggered. Strange. There were two possibilities: either the breaker did not work or the fuse just melted because of a high temperature triggered by a poor contact.
I replaced the fuse and when I was putting the plug together, I spotted that "-" contact plate was touching the "+" core where the fuse was. Therefore, the most likely reason for blowing the fuse was a short-circuit. I cut a piece from both negative plates, so that they didn't touch the positive one. The dish worked. I still had Internet. No major drama.
Thursday 7 September 2023
The wind did become lighter late night but it was still sailable around 9-12 kts apparent at 50 to 80° on a portside. It was about 3 kts stronger than in a forecast. The speed though water was consistently close to 6 kts and over ground usually less because of a current.
I found the last piece of tuna in my fridge. Now I could turn it off and move the rest of the food to my larger fridge (initially an ice box, where I later installed a condenser and a compressor). I would fish again in a day or two.
Friday 8 September 2023
Yana's birthday! Happy birthday, my daughter! I call tomorrow as it is still 7th in DR. Hopefully, she would join me in the Caribbean.
The wind was light first half of the day blowing 4 to 8 kts from behind. Beruta was sailing 2 to 3 kts downwind under the mainsail. Afternoon, the wind shifted forward. Reaching was much easier at this speed, especially with a help of the genoa. At night, as usual, the wind increased to 10-12 kts and I even took one reef on the main following an autopilot's wish. It was dismissed and substituted with the windpilot soon after.
Saturday 9 September 2023
The wind was good all day. Beruta was mostly reaching 5 - 6 kts.
I was thinking of some possible differences between sailing west along 12° S and 20° S. In terms of the wind, according to the climatology, it seems to be more or less the same. One possible feature of the 12° route is the South Equatorial Current, which again according to the climatology, may help especially at the first leg from Darwin to Christmas Island. It runs westward somewhere from 0.5 to 1 kt. Wikipedia says that it spreads from 10° S to 20° S. The more south, the weaker the current though. The route along 12° is obviously longer and hotter.
Expecting the wind to increase at night, I finally changed the genoa to the jib before the sunset. Reaching without a foresail at all was noticeably slower. I knew that I wouldn't be fond of changing the foresails at night, especially now, when the bow was mostly occupied by the dinghy and had less room to work there with the sails. Taking one more reef on the mainsail if needed, was not a big problem at night.
Sunday 10 September 2023
I attempted to fish imagining a fish soup made of a mahi-mahi head. Instead, I ended up eating a canned salmon salad for lunch and fried canned beans with onion for supper. I blamed a slow speed due to light winds.
I was broad reaching under the mainsail only. When the wind angle is more than 130 degrees, a foresail doesn't work. I was still facing strong opposite current from time to time up to 2 kts! The following currents seemed to have been less frequent and not as strong.
I changed the time zone from Darwin's UTC+9.5 to UTC+7 to have sunrises and sunsets at the usual time, 6 o'clock. It corresponded to Christmas Island and Jakarta time, the longitude of which I had already passed.
Monday 11 September 2023
Same story - no fresh fish, and as a result - a canned salmon soup for lunch.
I spent most of the time in the last couple of days reading Jewish and Russian humor as well as some news articles from Nature and Science journals. Internet was working!
Since I crossed 15° latitude south a day ago, the air temperature became more pleasant, under 30° C in the cabin and much less outside. No rain but occasionally some clouds. The wind was around 8-12 kts. By the end of the week, the forecast said it would increase to 25 kts.
Afternoon the wind shifted forward and I hoisted the jib increasing the through water speed to over 6 kts but over the ground speed was a knot lower due to the current.
Tuesday 12 September 2023
I was surprised seeing a frigate this morning. The last time I saw them could have been in the Caribbean sea. Even more surprising was that it was alone.
Wednesday 13 September 2023
The first thing that I saw this morning when I went up the cockpit was a cargo ship in a not so far distance. I checked the chartplotter if it was shown there. And it was, just far enough to trigger the alarm.
Thursday 14 September 2023
The wind was still weak, the contrary current was still prevailing and the mainsail - flapping. A 24-hour mileage was a bit depressing, 84 nm.
I was happy that with a single fridge running, I had enough solar power to keep my batteries charged without running the engine every day.
Friday 15 September 2023
The forecast promised strong wind over the weekend and the beginning of the next week. Up to 30 kts on Monday. The wind would gradually increase starting from 15 kts today to 20 tomorrow, then to 25 on Sunday.
I decided that I wouldn't need my jib in such weather, and used the relatively calm conditions to change it for the storm one. I might trade my mainsail to the storm jib in the 30 kt wind.
Saturday 16 September 2023
Below 17° S at night I wore a fleece jacket and felt pretty comfortable in a day. No sweating doing morning exercises and yoga.
Early morning I passed the 2,000 nm mark. On Monday, I hoped Beruta would have made half-way to Reunion after 3 weeks crossing the Indian Ocean.
After few days of cleaning the deck from flying fish, finally I caught a real one! At first, I thought that it was a small mahi-mahi but when I brought it closer, it happened to be a big wahoo! It died at the scene, so I didn't have to waste my rum. The good thing was that it was still intact. It occupied the whole fridge. I thought that it would have fed me for the rest of my voyage.
Sunday 17 September 2023
The wind as forecasted increased to 20 kts. I took two reefs and one more in the evening when it started to gust to 25 kts.
Monday 18 September 2023
It was windy and choppy. The wave heights in the forecast was 3.6 m. I was broad reaching with 3 reefs on the mainsail at 5-6 kts.
There were few short squalls afternoon and in the evening. At night much stronger and longer squalls happened. My nerves broke when it was blowing 32 kts and gusting to 40. Even the wind pilot was not able to cope with it. Beruta went closer to the wind making it even stronger. I let go the halyard and lowered the main. I was about to hoist the storm jib but looked at the speed. It was 5 kts under bare poles. I decided to sail without any sails. Of course, once the squall passed, the speed dropped to 3-4 kts, which was still not bad. I didn't want to lower and raise the storm jib all night as the squalls continued.
Tuesday 19 September 2023
The squalls were over by the morning and I hoisted the storm jib first and then the main with 3 reefs. The wind was 16-20 gusting to 22-24, and Beruta was broad reaching at around 6.
Using a freezer set to -6° C, did require charging batteries by running an engine, especially in cloudy weather. So I ran Yanmar for a couple of hours this morning.
I had headaches for the last two nights. I suspected there could have been something wrong with the fish that I ate. I only cooked flesh and discarded all the internal organs because the liver for example, could have accumulated dangerous amounts of vitamin A or other stuff.
I decided to catch another fish and stop eating this wahoo for now. Of course, the headaches could have been caused by something else. Perhaps, by a chess game that I tried to play with my Mac or reading Feynman's physics lectures. Although I hadn't played a night before and I had been reading Feynman a few times before. In general, I rarely had the headaches and usually got rid of them by a relaxation. Last night it was very difficult to do rolling in my bed from one side to the other.
Another milestone today - 2,000 nm left to Reunion or two and a half week of sailing.
It took almost an hour to connect to Starlink today. I think the problem has been its internal GPS. In the debug window of the app, it shows that GPS is not valid. Once it gets valid, the status changes from booting to searching. It becomes online in about 5 minutes after that. Yesterday, it connected surprisingly fast, in about 7 minutes. Usually, it takes from 10 to 30 minutes and one or two reboots. I normally wait for 10-15 minutes, and if GPS stays invalid, I power cycle the dish. In most cases it helps. On the next boot, GPS status changes to valid in 5 to 10 minutes. I think there must be some dish software bug somewhere as all my GPSes find a fix in 5-10 minutes even inside the cabin. Interestingly enough, while the dish is waiting for the GPS fix (booting status), its power consumption remains the highest, around 60 watts. Why does it need so much power to get the fix?
When I walked Te Araroa Trail (TA) across entire New Zealand, I heard of another even longer trail in the US called PCT (Pacific Crest Trail), which goes from the Mexican to the Canadian border mostly in the mountains. It is over 4,200 km, almost 1.5 times longer than TA. I would need at least 5 months to walk it from May to September. This is the season more or less free from snow. I started to read more about this exciting trip, which hopefully I would be able to do next year. As you see, being four months at sea, I've already missed the mountains.
Wednesday 20 September 2023
The wind became light at night but I waited till the morning to take 2 reefs off and replace the storm jib with the normal one.
I was reaching 5-6 kts with 12-15 kt wind plus 1 kt of the following current! Finally, after passing 2,500 nm from Darwin, the current flowed more my way than the opposite.
Thursday 21 September 2023
It was a busy morning. The wind became light again. I took off the reefs. Then there was a head-on collision situation with LPG. My collision detection software alarmed me with the beeping sound and a picture.
The north is up. The red line is the LPG course sailing from the bottom left corner. The green line, my course almost in the opposite direction, is practically invisible because of the large speed differences and an intersection being very close to my position. It is in the top right corner though. My speed is about 2-3 kts and LPG's - 15. It says that the intersection of our courses is in 0.06 nm from my position, which I would reach in 2 minutes and 23 seconds, and LPG would reach it in 37 minutes and 24 seconds, meaning that she would pass Beruta at the stern and I would pass in front of her.
While I was thinking to change my course to the right, which would have required gybing, LPG changed its course to its right, and we seemed to have been ok. But then the wind changed, and Beruta gybed, so I had to let the preventer go to allow the boom to swing to the portside. Because I had practically no speed and rolled violently flapping with the mainsail, I had to start the engine and switch from windpilot to autopilot. While I was doing all these, the wind changed again. Anyway, I thought LPG had seen all my troubles and changed the course accordingly to avoid the collision.
The weather was not pleasant. There were those clouds with some rain that altered the wind when they were passing by. I had to lower and raise the jib and start the engine few times.
Afternoon the weather improved. Beruta was reaching 6 kts in 15 kt wind gusting to 20 under the jib and the main with 3 reefs.
After lunch, I wanted to have a nap. As soon as I laid down, I heard something banged at the stern. I thought that it could have been fish. I went to the cockpit to see. The bungee cord was not stretched but the line tied to it in case it breaks was wrapped around the outboard. This was strange. Then I realized that the banging sound was caused by the bungee cord when the fishing line tore apart. I pulled it around yo-yo and it was broken approximately in the middle.
One might just speculate whether it was big fish that got attracted by some weird sport interest to my small pink squid or bigger fish that attacked smaller one that I caught.
I repaired my fishing gear but did not catch anything before dark. I did not fish at night because this was the sure thing to lose the gear. I had learned it by doing it.
Friday 22 September 2023
It was a pleasant sailing weather most of the day. Beruta was reaching around 6 kts with 15 kt wind.
In the evening when I reeled the fishing line in, I found a piece of flesh on the hook meaning that there had been fish there at some point, I just didn't know about it.
Saturday 23 September 2023
The day started with clouds and some rain but later it was fine. The wind was 10-15 kts. Beruta was broad reaching under the main with a single reef at 5 kts, later with the jib and the doubled reefed main at almost 6 kts.
It had almost become a tradition to meet a cargo ship early in the morning on my portside. To be fair, I met another one last night at the similar distance and bearing.
At night the wind was gusting to 22 kts and I lowered the jib and sailed under the main with 2 reefs. It was slow, around 4 kts.
Sunday 24 September 2023
In the morning the wind was still fresh and I decided to hoist the storm jib on top of the jib, i.e. without taking the jib off the forestay. It worked but the wind diminished when I finished. I had to go back to the jib but it was quicker this time since it was already on the forestay.
Forecast said 20 kts but it was less than 15.
Sometimes I thought that I was birding and fishing at the same time. Both creatures seemed to have been attracted to my pink squid. The birds though seemed to have been smarter than fish. They didn't just attack the bait. They slowly came very close and had a good look. They nevertheless still attempted to take it, I supposed to have tried what it tasted. This careless action could have cost them a life. I had never caught a bird though.
This morning I passed 3,000 nm on the course plus 58 miles off it. 1,409 nm was left to Reunion. So far the average speed over ground was not impressive - just 4.7 kts. In the past my average speed crossing Atlantic and Pacific oceans was better: 4.8 - 4.9 I believed. I hoped that it would have improved by the end of the voyage.
The forecast for the next week was good, mostly 20 kt wind.
Monday 25 September 2023
The fifth week of sailing across Indian Ocean.
There was a morning shower with little wind followed it. Then the light wind was prevailing during the day and the night.
I finally was able to clarify the issue with the Starlink GPS. Well, it seems to be true for any GPS. Apparently, there are three start modes: cold, warm and hot. The cold mode is the longest because it requires to obtain the almanac of all satellites. The minimum time it can be retrieved is 12.5 minutes. If I was able to force the GPS to start in the cold mode, a Startlink dish would have got the fix in 15-20 minutes. I know the Starlink GPS starts in the warm mode, because it has the valid almanac, which it got a day before and it has its previous position. If a boat stayed within 100 km of it, the GPS would have been able to locate the satellites in 2-4 minutes. It only needs to get ephemeris data from them, which are sent every 30 seconds. But because the boat moves more than 200 km from its previous position, the warm start wouldn't work. Of course, the GPS does not know it, although it could have predicted it from a boat speed and a direction. Anyway, it starts in the warm mode and spends probably around 15 minutes trying to find the satellites. Once it fails, it restarts in the cold mode.
Tuesday 26 September 2023
I started the engine early in the morning because the wind practically died. After motoring for 3 hours, I switched to the jib and full main. The wind was SE 10-12 kts. Afternoon, it became light and following. The jib had to be gone.
At sunset, I started to reel the fishing line in and I realized that it had something at the end. That something was not gliding on a surface but it was moving in deep water. I was surprised to find that it was nevertheless mahi-mahi! A relatively small one. I supposed because of slow speed, it had not been exhausted enough. My hands were occupied and I didn't prepare a fishing hook. Well, it was not a big fish. I hoped that the line would have held it when I lift it aboard, and it did. No rum was wasted either!
I threw frozen wahoo overboard to free a space in my freezer, and birds were really happy to have it for a late supper. Hopefully, they wouldn't have a headache. Now I had something good to eat for the rest of my voyage!
Wednesday 27 September 2023
The Starlink dish spent about an hour in a search mode and did not find any satellites. I tried a second time in the evening, and turned it off after hopelessly waiting for 15 minutes in the search mode. The "low signal" indicator stayed mostly on. In the past it had been flipping between on and off more frequently. I supposed that in the search mode, the "low signal" was an expected default value because the dish was still trying to find a satellite to talk to. When the "low signal" was flipping to "normal signal", the dish was communicating to one of the satellites.
At sunset there was 1,000 nm left to Reunion.
Thursday 28 September 2023
The same result today - no Internet. This was from about 74°E to 72°E along 20°S. Hopefully, closer to the African continent, I would eventually get it. This proved that the Starlink coverage was less than 100%.
Afternoon the wind increased to 20 kts. I took one then another reef on the main. No jib. Speed was 5-6 kts.
Friday 28 September 2023
I was surprised when the wind became less than 15 kts around 4 AM (UTC+7). It was supposed to be blowing for another day or two. It was cloudy, so I blamed the clouds for disturbing the wind. Unfortunately, that was not the case. Simply, the 3-day weather forecast was wrong! Not just inaccurate!
Now I became a bit worried about my new ETA. I thought that given 15-20 kt wind, I would have arrived Reunion in a week, exactly next Friday morning. With 5 to 10 kt wind, it was questionable to say the least.
My worries soon dissipated because the wind shifted forward, and I was able to raise the jib. Beruta was reaching at 5-6 kts. Even later in the day, when the wind shifted backward, and only the mainsail with a single reef remained, I was still making over 6 kts because of a strong current. My average speed increased to 4.8 kts!
This was the third day without Internet. The "low signal" area was now extended to 21°S 69° E. Beruta was just 300 nm east of Rodrigues Island.
Saturday 30 September 2023
At night the wind was fresh, around 20 kts but was changing its direction wildly because of many little squalls following one after another. I fell asleep only in the morning.
Still no Internet.
Sunday 1 October 2023
Changed the timezone to Reunion (UTC+4).
Wind around 12 kts E.
And again, no Internet, just 100 nm SE of Rodrigues Island. This is becoming suspicious. I remember, when I tried to manually update the dish software using the iOS app, the dish rebooted and it was demonstrating the same behaviour: it displayed the low signal and remained in the search mode forever or until I power cycled it. I don't know whether it rolled back the software at that time or whether it was updated at all. Unfortunately, I didn't find any way to roll the software back neither in the app nor in the dish web GUI. The help section of the GUI was explaining how to reset the Wi-Fi router settings by quickly power cycling it 3 times within 2-3 seconds. I tried that naively hoping that it might have done the same to the dish but no luck, no Internet.
I think the last option that I would try when I arrive to Reunion will be reconnecting the dish motor and letting it to position itself rather than operating flat. This might improve the signal.
When I was turning on the tri-color light, it was 500 nm to Pointe Des Galets.
Monday 2 October 2023
At midnight, Beruta passed Rodrigues Island about 75 nm south of it. The next island, just north of the route would be Mauritius. It was roughly 300 nm from Rodrigues.
The wind shifted north of the east forcing me to gybe. This was the first gybe when I remained on the opposite tack. It happened around 3AM.
The wind calmed down to 6-10 kts before the earth exposed the vessel and the crew to the tropical sun. I checked the diesel in the tank. It was 80 liters. I pumped 20 liters from a jerry can and left one full jerry can in a cockpit locker. In other words, I had the full tank, 120 liters, for the rest of my trip. I imagined that I could run the engine for a few hours or even a day or two while waiting for the better wind.
Once I started the engine, I noticed that the top mainsail slider was disconnected from the mast. I thought that the wild flapping had just pulled it out. When I lowered the sail, I found that the tape had just been torn up. Well, it had happened before so many times. Fixing it wasn't something new to me. And it was a perfect time to do that. I pulled out all the sliders, so that I could easily sit on the deck and repair the top one without risking to fall over board. Beruta was rolling stronger under the bare pole. I put a new tape and sewed it with a whipping twine. Then I raised the full main and continued motorsailing.
This was the sixth week sailing from Darwin to Reunion, and the captain opened the last bottle of rum. He hoped this week would have also been the last. Beruta sailed 4,000 nm from Darwin.
Again, and again, there was no Internet. I checked twice: in the morning and in the evening. The dish was stuck in the searching mode.
I tried last time around 11PM and... yeah! I finally got connected! Some folks (my daughter) got nervous that I disappeared for almost a week and were wondered if a boat could sail alone without a captain. They had still seen Beruta at the Marine Traffic AIS tracking system.
Tuesday 3 October 2023
An updated weather forecast predicted dead calm for two days including yesterday. The fuel that I saved was barely enough to make it.
I emailed my updated ETA to port authorities in Pointe Des Galets saying that I would either arrive Thursday night or next morning. Since I was running an engine in low RPM sailing at 4.2 kts, it appeared that it would have likely been Friday. I needed 6 kts to be there by Thursday evening.
I had to open a battery compartment to allow one of the batteries to cool down. Its temperature (44° C) was getting close to the critical 49° C. AGM batteries could have been damaged if it were exceeded.
Wednesday 4 October 2023
I woke up around 5AM and noticed 10 kt wind on my Raspberry Pi display at 90° on the portside. I raised the jib, the full main and stopped the engine. Unfortunately, it was a false alarm caused by a dark cloud. After 30 minutes the wind died.
I checked the amount of fuel in the tank. There were 30 liters. I pumped the diesel from the last canister to the tank. Now I should have been able to motor for at least another 12 hours. According to the weather forecast, the wind should have started around noon.
I received a reply to my email sent to port authorities in Reunion. Jerome said that I should have adjusted my speed according to the operating hours of the harbour. It was only open from 8AM to 3PM! Ah, it was good to know. It would have been even better to know it in advance. There was no point rushing to the harbour to get there by 6PM, for example. I only knew that it operated while it was a daylight.
At 7AM it was still 220 nm to go or 110 nm a day at 4.6 kts. I started the engine intending to stop it no matter what around 1PM.
11AM I raised the jib and the full main. The wind was barely 10 kts and the speed was around 4. The wind was supposed to increase but I became impatient and changed the jib for the genoa. Then in about an hour, the wind did increase to 15 gusting to 20 kts. I took one reef on the main but it was still too fast, over 6.5 kts. I just dropped the genoa, and the speed dropped to 5 kts under the reefed mainsail. This was enough, so I didn't bother with changing the genoa back for the jib.
A couple of hours before the sunset, I spotted a fish at the end of my fishing line trying to get off the hook. It seemed to have been mahi-mahi about the same size as I had caught before. And just as I started to pull it to the boat, it escaped! Damn it! Oh, well, I still had time before dark.
And indeed, when I went to the cockpit to reel my trolling line in for the night, there was another mahi-mahi at the end! And it was bigger than the first one. I was able to get it close to the boat. It was already dark, and I couldn't hit it with my fishing hook. I missed two or three times, and the fish was jerking violently trying to escape. At last, I caught it with the hook but at that moment, it got free from the fishing line! It was heavy, and I was afraid that I could drop it. Then it would be lost. All in all, it went fine. I managed to pull it under the pushpit to the cockpit. The knife was ready but it took me some time and quite an effort to calm it down.
I spent half an hour cutting it into pieces. I had to discard the head and the tail because they were too big to fit either a fridge or a cooking pan. Another half an hour was spent on cleaning the cockpit. Now I had something to eat in Reunion. I hoped that the biosecurity officials wouldn't take it.
Thursday 5 October 2023
Around 3AM I was passing Mauritius Island on my starboard 24 miles away. I clearly saw its numerous lights.
When the sun came up, I saw the island north-east of me because of its high mountains. Then I also saw the even higher mountains of Reunion further west.
At 8:30 AM I was 100 nm from Pointe des Galets. Just another day of sailing.
In the morning there was a period with the lighter wind. I hoisted the genoa for few hours.
I tried to connect my Starlink to the Internet at noon. The dish spent over an hour in the search mode and did not find a satellite. It searched for 30 minutes, rebooted, searched for another 30 minutes, rebooted and so on. There was something peculiar about it. Two days ago I had had the same trouble but once connected, the link had remained stable. It had never been dropped for almost two days! The ground station had been in Lagos, Nigeria though. Before they all had been in Australia or Indonesia. I thought I needed to enable motors and allow the dish to position itself. The flat horizontal position must have been working in areas with a better coverage but the areas with a poor one, probably needed a stronger signal from a dish. For this I needed to connect the motors and raise the holding socket for the dish mast above the solar panel to allow it rotating freely. This was something to do in Reunion.
Friday 6 October 2023
I arrived to Pointe des Galets at 7AM. I circled in front of the entrance to the port till 8AM. I called the marina on channel 9 but there was no response. I called CROSS Reunion on channel 16 and they advised to call port authorities in channel 12. I did, and they insisted on calling the marina on channel 9. After that I got the response. I was advised to enter the harbour and come along the wall. A lady from the marina met me there and helped with the lines and explained that this was just temporary for the clearance and later I would move to the marina berth.
As soon as I tied up, custom offices appeared on the wharf. They asked for my passport, the boat registration and the clearance from Darwin. In 3 minutes they reviewed my documents and handed me the inbound clearance. They asked about the country of my birth and how long the voyage took. They also asked how long I intended to stay. The lady from the marina gave me the biosecurity clearance and said it was ok. I understood that it was ok to get it without an inspection! Then I moved to the marina. Super easy and fast clearance!
I spent an hour or so cleaning Beruta with fresh water from the salt. Then I tidied the deck, covered the mainsail and made a shadow in the cockpit. Then I cycled to a mega mall to get an Orange SIM card but I didn't take my passport, and a photocopy was not sufficient, nor a driving license. Oh, well, it was expensive anyway, 15 euros for the card plus 15 for every 2 GB of data. This was double of the Starlink price! I thought that I would probably have been ok with a free Wi-Fi in the marina.
Indian Ocean is now almost behind me. There are still 1,300 nm left to Richard's Bay in South Africa. I hope I sail there in a couple of weeks. This and then rounding two capes, Agulhas and Good Hope on the way to Cape Town, will probably be the most dangerous part of the Indian Ocean crossing.
So far it was an easy-going passage. Only one night was rough and squally when I sailed under bare poles. The rest was either pleasant or boring depending on the wind. Certainly, the first section, half-way to Christmas Island was windless and not so enjoyable. Water, fuel and provision were sufficient. And there was no shortage of fresh fish.
All pictures from Reunion are on Google Photos and a video for the entire voyage from New Zealand to Reunion is on YouTube.