Preparation

Its time for an update...

We got a professional in and he checked ALL the electrics and fixed and replaced where necessary, with the main focus on the charging systems to make sure we don't get flat batteries. Next in line was to fix the instruments. Shortly after that, we set about removing all the old wires that were no longer being used.

You will recall the delivery of our "perfect" boat that dared to spring a .......  leak?

Well, it turns out it was a Houddini leak that had everyone hunting to find it. Luckily Kax was already in the Cape and was staying on the boat so the family decided, as payment for staying on the boat, she would have to try and find this leak. After many days of searching ....Eureka! She found the leak! The water was trickling through one of the keel bolts, so Dad flew down to Cape Town to check it out. He took the boat out of the water and sealed the keel bolts properly. Success! No more keel leaks. Dad was also chuffed with the new tiller.

While the boat was out the water, the family was excited to hear that the sponsorship from Investec had been finalised. Super timing! Now we placed our order at North Sails for 3 new spinnakers with Investec logo. Shortly after the order, our boat was branded with some "subtle" Investec stickers. Glider eyewear came around and gave us some stylish polarised sunglassses. Xtra-Link then came on board to help out with our telecommunication needs. I am really amped about this - this means we will be able to keep the blog running during the race!  It's awesome to get all the feed-back from our followers.

A few days later, back at home, Kax started to get our victuals ready. Dad was at work, Mom, Ryan, Ricky and I were at Midmar for Sailing Youth Nationals. Brennan was finishing up his studies. On the 22nd we all congregated at home - except for poor Bren. We finished getting the rations ready and packed the whole day. Afterwards we took a break and enjoyed the Carols by Candlelight in JHB.

Brennan was let off the study leash to join us for a strategy session over a delicious Christmas eve dinner - courtesy of our resident chef: Dad.

Eight days to go........ I can't wait!

Hope you all had a Merry Christmas!

Michaela

Mossel Bay 2 Cape Town in a humans eyes

Hi all,

So here's what happened...

We left Mossel Bay harbour at 22:30 on 26/11/2013 after having our safety briefing and getting into our oilies and putting on our harnesses and casting off. There was no wind leaving MB so we motored out. Bren and myself were on the first watch, I was sent to the foredeck with a flash light to look out for rocks, whales  and containers. I spotted a whale about 20 meters starboard to us and managed to get past it quietly. At 23:15 we decided to put the main up. I helmed until I couldn't anymore (because I got sick). Just before the end of my shift I was leaning  over the end when I suddenly saw Torpedoes. there were so many dolphins following us for 15 minutes in the phosphorescence. The next day was ok, but there I was,super sea sick.

Photo taken by Jay Caboz

The evening of the 27th was nice we had the code zero up, but I was still horribly sick so I didn't go on my first watch. Alexa did it for me. The my next watch was the dog watch and boy oh boy that was not pleasant (because I was still a bit sick, and it was really early). As the clock struck 04:45, we were broaching like there was no tomorrow, so when it was the end of our shift at 05:00 we called up Dad and Jay and tried to get this HUGE Code Zero down. We were battling, just the four of us so I called Alex. I had to eventually get on the foredeck with Bren and help. That was really cool, exciting but also scary because we were still broaching.  

Jay Caboz 

We poled out the number 3 and started SHUNTING. To quote what a dashing young man once said from a few years back (Brennan): “There were waves the size of mountains and the wind blowing the spots of dog and we were just sitting  in it FLYING, FLYING”. We crossed False Bay really quickly.

Photo taken by Jay Caboz

As soon as we got to Clifton the wind died and we had to motor the rest of the way which doesn't look good considering you just sailed from Mossel bay or  Durban. We tied up at Royal Cape around 11h00.

Jay Caboz

The next morning I woke up to Bren and Dad super chuffed because they got the desalinater working again. Ciao Bella looked and felt very good, and I think she is just about ready for the race.

Go to http://jaycaboz.wordpress.com/2013/12/04/port-elizabeth-to-cape-town-on-a-yacht/ to check out more of Jay Caboz's pictures

Michaela out.

Leaving Mossel Bay

There is nothing quite like the feeling of making port, and having friendly faces there to meet you. In Mossel Bay it was Rob Holden who met us on the docks and arranged a mooring for us for the night, as well as a hot shower at the MBYBC.

It had been a pretty arduous journey thus far, and thankfully we suffered minimal casualties. One was our cherished heavy black spinnaker which we had to set free off the wild coast, the other was Oom Andries, who took quite a hard fall during the last night of the passage and cracked a rib. Not to take any chances with it, we said farewell to Andries who hopped a plane the rest of the way to Cape Town.

Proudly brought to you by Jay Caboz

The rest of the day was spent turning the boat inside out to dry everything, and frantically calling around to organise delivery crew. Our dear friend from the Wits to Rio team, Alexa Brown, flew up from Cape Town to help out and to boost her night-watch hours.

Jay Caboz

We also figured that Dad's presence would be great, and somehow, young Michaela caught wind of this. When she asked Dad if she could come with, he said maybe. Keen as mustard, her bags were packed and at the door in the next 5 minutes. How can you say no to that?

So in one fell swoop not only did we have enough crew to take the boat the rest of the way to Cape Town, but we also unintentionally tipped the linguistic balance of the crew from 75% Afrikaans to 16.66% Afrikaans.

Everyone arrived in time for dinner with the Holdens and a 22:00 departure to catch the impending easterly.

This is where I let Michaela take over the storytelling...

Brennan

Durban to Mossel Bay

The westerly had just abated and we left Durban harbour at 22:00 on the night of Thursday 21/11. Heaven forbid we leave on a Friday, every mariner knows what bad luck that brings! We started off in little to no wind, but by 10:00 the next morning the north-easter had arrived. When the breeze passed the 18 knot threshold, we dropped Günter (our new light spinnaker) and put up our trusted heavy black kite.

At around midday the breeze had increased significantly to around 28 knots, and that's when we got the spinnaker wrapped on the forestay. We tried everything to get it down, but after about 20 minutes, the top of the spinnaker gave in and tore down to the middle - tightening the wrap on the forestay in the process. The wind was now so strong and the wrap so tight, that the only way to get the remaining spinnaker off the forestay was to cut it free. It was a heartbreaking call to make, but it had to be done.


After that we hoisted our little red storm spinnaker, but when the wind touched 30 knots we decided that discretion was the betternpart of valour. We dropped the spinnaker and polled out the storm jib in stead.
We saw through the night with a reefed mainsail and the storm jib poled out. Nice and comfortable. At 2 am our sleigh-ride ended with the north easter disappearing. Some time after 20:00 that night we lost our speed and depth instruments to water damage, but the last top speed that we saw was 16.2 knots over water. The water damage also took out our GPS, so we were resorting to three-point fixes, dipping light-houses and other non-electronic methods of fixing our position.


At 10:00 the next morning (Saturday 23/11) we managed to bypass the broken instruments in the SeaTalk system, and get our GPS working again, thanks to our resident electrical engineer - Oom Andries. We were past East London at this stage and had made excellent time.


Halfway between East London and Port Alfred the south-wester returned, at about 20 knots on the nose. The sailing was uncomfortable and wet for the 12 hours it lasted, until it died off completely near Bird Island lighthouse. It was a long motor across Algoa (Nelson Mandela) Bay, and we stopped in at Port Elizabeth at 09:00.


The purpose of the stop was twofold: the rudder bearings had  a bit of movement in them to be inspected, and we had to make a crew exchange. Wentzel had to fly home for a family commitment, and a friend from Wits, Jay Caboz, was to get his first taste of ocean sailing. Jay is a journalist with Forbes Africa  magazine, and very talented photographer.


We had some other friends meet us in PE too, but not for the sail. Ronnie Baer arranged us a mooring for the day, and carted people around to airports, shops and petrol stations. Dad's cousin Christine Schoeman brought us some essential stocks (rusks, brownies and a phone charger), and her husband Oom Louis brought along some tools to help us disassemble the rudder bearing.


By lunch time, we were ready again, and the easterly wind had arrived. Jay had his baptism of fire beating up past Cape Recife, but as soon as we turned the corner life just got much better. We had about 25-30 knots behind us and building, and the storm jib poled out with 2 reefs in the main.


What a night that was. We headed out downwind on port-tack, and put a gybe in close to midnight. By the time the morning rolled around we had almost reached Knysna!  In two shifts during the night (3 hours each) we covered almost 90 nautical miles. Our maximum apparent wind was 42 knots, so we're guessing that the true wind speed crossed the 50 mark at a stage.

The breeze had dropped off by morning. Which left us a bit of light wind beating to Mossel Bay.


There's still more to come...



Brennan

The Durban Prep

When I arrived back in Durban, I was not even surprised to find that two most hard-working members if this family had levelled mountains of tasks. Dad and Kathryn worked tirelessly putting fittings on, arranging the safety equipment, doing all the victualing for the delivery and so on.

First thing on Monday morning I had to write the theory exam for my SAS Coastal Skippers ticket. This meant a heap of cramming the night before, and another 4am morning to study. Straight after the exam I had to bolt to the airport to fetch Alex Ham- a friend who'd be helping with the delivery. As soon as we got back to the marina we hit the boat-work punch-list.

After rushing around on Tuesday morning for SAMSA safety certificates and such, I had my practical exam for my skippers. We were due to leave on Thursday,, so the pressure on this practical was through the roof. It went successfully

Fellow Boskopers, Andries Swart and Wentzel Coetzer arrived for delivery duty on Tuesday afternoon, and immediately got to work on the boat. It was all a mad rush, and after the umpteenth 14 hour day we were ready to go!

On the tail of a big Durban westerly, we set off for Cape Town...

Brennan out.

The Abnormal Roadtrip

Sunday 10 November was set aside for finally loading Ciao Bella onto the trailer. This was an exceptionally exciting time because it meant that all of our yard-work was over. The abnormal load permits arrived on Monday the 11th, and at 5am on Tuesday the convoy left Carletonville - one MAN truck driven by Robtek's trusted Danny-boy, followed by a step-deck trailer carrying the precious cargo, and Toyota Fortuner escort vehicle driven by yours truly.

 

 

 

 At 60km/h this was going to be a long journey, which got made slightly longer when we were made to stop in Harrismith because we didn't have the right sticker on the back of our trailer (can you say J22 nationals?). After hunting around for a short while, we found the correct stickers and got on our way again.

We were set for a 5pm arrival in Durban until we got flagged over to a weigh-bridge on Estcourt. Unfortunately we were dealt the Simon Cowell of traffic officers, who told us that some information on our permits had been filled in the wrong block. He then took the liberty of calling the KZN traffic dept and had them cancel our permits, and instructed them not to issue a new permit to us before 12.30 the next day. So we parked the truck at the weigh-bridge for the night, and I went to spend the night in Maritzburg, ready to pick up the new permits the following day. As the clock struck 12.30 the permits were issued, and we continued our journey.

 

 

We made it to Durban before nightfall, but a whole day behind schedule. Thursday we offloaded the boat at Durban Marina Yacht Lift, and fitted the keel and the rudder. Ricky and Lauren (Rick's girlfriend) we're there to help out from here. Friday we had the SAMSA hull inspection, erected the mast and launched the boat (woohoo!). Saturday we did the rigging and the remainder of the deck fitting. The had to jet back to Jozitown for the Wits Yacht Club dinner.

 

 

 

All of this stuff sounds pretty quick and easy, but we were grafting 14/15 hour days to get everything right. From sweltering Durban heat to pouring rain, the work didn't stop. In the words of every South African rugby captain: "you know, all credit to the boys", Danny and Ernesto from Robtek helped us get there and offloaded safely, but our boys Simon and Johannes have played out of their boots in getting this boat on the water and working. That's a big chunk of job done.

 

We left the rest of the family in Durbs to continue the graft. keep tuned in for more updates!

Brennan

There have been whispers...

Whispers of history repeating itself, with a bit of a twist. Whispers of an audacious feat to be undertaken again, by the same family. Whispers that Michael Robinson is going to be pouring out his retirement-fund into another Cape to Rio Race.

This is to confirm that the rumours are, in fact, true. We will be entering in the 2014 Cape to Rio Race, again as a family and again on Ciao Bella.

Where this campaign differs from the 2011 race, is that this time we own the boat, this time Ryan and Michaela will not be shying away from any big weather, this time our beloved cousin Bradley will be on a different boat (www.witscapetorio2014.com/), this time we know what to expect, and this time we intend to win.

As you all know, this game is fraught with uncertainties, hence the silence on the topic from our front. But things are looking good. We have spent the better part of a year's weekends, evenings and holidays working on the boat and getting Ciao Bella in tip-top shape. We'll post some summaries of the work that we've done in due time.


Aside from all that, we invite you all to join in this adventure with us. One of the greatest parts about the last race was the number of people we reached and connected with through the blog and the race, from new friends to old friends to total strangers. So if you know of anyone who might be interested in what we're doing, please share, and invite, and include...

Wishing you all well,

The Robinsons