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Update 1 | Update 2
Update 3 | Update 4
Update 6 | Update 7
Update 8 | Update 9
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Update 2 - May 13th - 1999
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Yes it's true, Condesa's beatiful wing has been shattered.
At around midnight on May 10th I was on watch about six miles off the
Guatemalan coast en route from Puerto Madero, Mexico to Puerto Quetzal,
Guatemala. My father, my only crewmember at the time, was peacefully
sleeping in the aft cabin. There were scattered squalls with some
occasional lightning, but the wind had more or less crapped out.
I was about a minute away from dropping the sails and motoring when a
20 knot gust came from the complete opposite direction. It was utter
pandemonium. The wind kept coming up and coming up, with gusts
changing 180 degrees at a time. Rain was coming down in buckets.
Seymour was out of bed like a shot, steering the boat in his underwear
while I scrambled around trying to drop every inch of canvas.....But I
wasn't fast enough. In the utter darkness and rain we were completely
disoriented. An accidental jibe, the sail back-winded, a sickening
crash. My dad yelled over the tempest "what the hell was that?" I
replied, "That must have been the preventer breaking!" A quick glance
revealed that..."That wasn't the preventer, that was the main boom!
We're in trouble now!"
The main boom and several of the battens were, well, no longer with us.
I scrambled around a bunch more to immobilize the wound, then we were
sitting in the cockpit, motoring our way along in the wind and rain,
dripping wet, saying "What the hell was that?" It all happened very
quickly, I supposed the way most accidents do. Luckily noone was hurt,
the sail was not torn and most importantly and amazingly, the very
expensive and laboriously-installed solar panels were not damaged,
which was amazing with many pounds of broken boom falling down on them.
A postmortem reveals very little to be learned. The preventer,
normally thought of as a safely device, can be very dangerous with an
unexpected wind shift. I will use it more sparingly in the future.
Since it just so happened I had the most brilliant improvisational
repair man and sailboat engineer in the world on board, me, and also my
dad whose not so bad either, we had a complete plan for repair by
sunrise.
Since the Chichicastenego Extruded Alluminum Alloy 'R Us Supply Shop
was a bit out of our way and Huitchiqhiche's Heliarc Welding Shop was
closed for the holidays, we opted for a repair using local supplies and
labor. For the outrageous price of 40 quetzals ($6), I had a guy here
in Antigua turn a piece of cypress wood on a lathe that will fit inside
the two broken pieces of the boom. Then we will drill through the
pieces and into the wood, put in a mess of wood screws and we should be
back in action. We won't know till we get back to the boat, but it
should be stronger than it was before, but kind of ugly. This would be
a temporary fix in California, but it's going to have to work out for
the rest of the journey in my current surroundings.
A mere flesh wound.
Other than that, thing's have been great. John Caron came down for two
weeks. He flew into Puerto Escondido, the Mexican Pipeline, and flew
out of Tapachula on the Guatemalan border. John, my dad and I made the
crossing of the infamous Gulf of Tehuantepec, the sixth most
boat-sinking body of water in the world. We had it super-easy. A day
and a half of beautiful sailing followed by two days of motoring.
Pussycat stuff.
Guatemala is a very pleasant surprise. We left the boat and jetted to
the high country; land of volcanoes, colonial architecture, indiginous
people in indiginous dress and the best coffee in the world (I just
bought three pounds). My dad and I did and 18 mile mountain bike ride
this morning through the neighboring villiages and coffee
fincas....great views.
I will have some new friends cruising with me for a while, Ka'ren and
Yehouta from Israel. Caron and I had a blast with them in Huatulco.
They were cruising on another boat as far as Puerto Madero, so I asked
them to join Condesa for the ride to Costa Rica.
Well, time is short. We are all heading back to the coast in the
morning.
I think Jim Smith and Mallory Samora will be the next visitors from El
Norte, arriving in June for their belated honeymoon. Full Moon In June
will be hapening in Costa Rica, where Condesa should be in about four
days.
Love
El Capitan
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