Our last 300 miles!

The human mind is a wonderful thing! As I sit at my dead still nav desk, having slept the sleep of the dead for last the 16hrs, I can hardly remember all the challenges and difficulties that were thrown up at us as we closed in on our destination! At the time, I felt that SAS must have been tipped off about this "Coastal Skipper" who had been cheeky enough to think he was equipped to cross oceans without their "Offshore" sanction, and they had somehow conspired with Neptune, Aeolus,Poseidan, World shipping, and Brazilian Fishermen, to throw every known trick in the book, plus a few unknown ones,just to test his metal! On some passages, 300 miles can slip by so effortlessly. On others, you are forced to scrap and fight for every mile! It started with changes to cloud formations which were inconsistent with the high pressure system trade winds that we had enjoyed for so long. I requested Grib file info for 72 hours over our planned route , to see what we should expect. No Joy! Could'nt get the data back- just have to cope with the the cards with which we were dealt. N/E trade winds started escalating , and seas building up to be quite
big. We were doing about 7 knots, with 2 reefs and a stormsail, and as I was just about to hand over watch to Mary, when we spotted a Brazilian fishing boat heading staight for us, going off pop on the vhf. We could hear him talking up a storm to another Fishing boat, and barely ten minutes later, we saw another Kamikaze Brazilian fishing boat deliberately steering into a
collision course 500 mts from our bow. They were all waving and cheering, so we we waved and cheered back as we would pass them with 60 mts to spare. Mary suddenly spotted a string of little white styrofoam floats on a blue line twenty mts in front of us! A Handbreak Turn at 7knots, in 4/5 mtr waves, is not to be recomended, but we missed their nets by a whisker!
Little white floats , in breaking seas! We managed a controlled gybe in 30 knts, and dropped down wind about a mile, before resuming our course. The wind and sea state picked up still further, so we added the third reef. We sailed along for a further hour, and the wind started to drop off quite fast. Within two hours we were totally becalmed for the first time on our travels. We decided to take time out for a quick rest, and an early supper, before resorting to Lord Perkins to push us along for a couple of hours. When Mary handed over to me at 3.00am the breeze was just beginning to fill in from the South East, and clouds were forming. We put 2 reefs in the main, and unfurled enough headsail to maintain 5 to 6 knots. By 4.30, the genoa was gone, the stormsail out, and I was wishing we had the third reef in ! The Main was totally dumped, and we were still doing 8 to 9 knots , crashing and bashing through and over the waves. Mary was down below calling on all her friends to start praying for her NOW! She said the noise was horrific, and with the washboards in place, she could'nt see if I was still attached! I hung in
till daylight, and we then added the third reef, which immediately caused the wind to start dropping! Too bad, lets just go at a leisurely 4 to 5 knots for a while! All the while, the AIS alarm is screaming the arrival of yet another ship within 8 miles radius, whose course we needed to plot. In those conditions, with our reduced sails, we would not have been too visible. We got into a routine of calling up those whose course put us at risk, just to alert them of our position and course. Most were very supportive and appreciative, but there were others who totally ignored one. One particular freighter , Castillo Placencia, totally ignored my warnings from 5 miles out that he was on a collission cours with us, and we ended up having to take our own avoiding action when he was half a mile away. Half an hour later, we were under attack from Queen Mary 2, coming staight at us at 19.5knots. I called them up a few times to warn them, ( but also to be able to log Sheer Tenacity" calling Queen Mary 2"), but they too never responded. By this time we were off Rio, and the VHF seems to have been hijacked by a assortment of fishermen and "locos", to the extent that is virtually unusable as a means of communication there. We spent most of that night being forced to listen to the orgasmic moans and cries of some loonies, interspersed with wild music! The Queen Mary 2 meanwile when she was about a mile away just
twitched her joystick steering , and the 6 drive pods immediately took her to a half a mile clearance !
Passing Rio as night set in could have been really special, but for the rain squalls and clouds which blocked most of it. We were able to see Corchevadia for most of the night, plus a few of the shapes rememberd from my last visit, Ille Ronde, Rasa, the densely populated and illuminated
Favellas up the side of the mountain . (Sugar Loaf can only be seen once in Guanabara bay)
We motorsailed down towards Ihla Grande in light airs, but the breeze veered right on to the nose, forcing us to drop the headsail, and proceed at a more leisurely rate. The last curve ball was a ship leaving the Sepetiba channel . AIS indicated he was heading straight for us, and as we were now a motor vessel too, we had to act accordingly! Problem was, he had a huge white bow, and a dark low back platform section. In the half lght of dawn, the white looked like the bridge structure at the back, with the low platform section in front, as one sees with most tankers! This created the illusion of it passing clearly to stb, when in fact it was coming straight at us ! Only when we saw the huge bow waves, as it smashed into the swells, did the profile get real. A swift and decisive turn to starboard, saw us pass safely at port to port!
Meanwhile, we were being charged down from behind by a Cruiseliner "Sovereign", at 16.5 knots, who was also making for the same confined entrance. Once clear of our weird carrier, a swift and decisive turn to Port was called for, to open up his direct course to the channel markers!
Four hours later we were happily anchored in this beatiful palm tree surrounded bay, sipping ice cold beers, forgetting all about the past couple of days! And YES, We would do it all again!!!