Antigua
It is grey outside, early dark and rain is dripping steadily on the canvas. By the time my liferaft is again certified and serviced for an amazing amount of money, the wind has died and will stay away for five days in a row. This is quite exceptional for the trades and gives my the opportunity to stay for the Antigua Classic week.
Ten years ago I remember our awe on the display of beautiful old style yachts, maintained to an standard where normal people can only dream of; a full time job for a small yacht to many for the bigger windjammers. This year there seem to be less boats, but still a joy to admire the details and the craftsmanship. Some of these classics I saw sailing in the bay yesterday and I am quite sure many modern yachts would have a hard time keeping up with their speed! Agile and easy to maneuver they turn like mosquitos between the anchored yachts here in Falmouth Harbour.
Nothing inside that boat, to keep the weight low!
This must be a joy to sail!
I have not seen this beauty in the channel islands.
I will keep you posted how the three days of racing goes with less than 5 knots of wind. I guess I can go out in the dinghy and make some nice pictures.
For the servicing of the liferaft: I kept a close look on what they did and finally saw our raft outside of the container and fully inflated. A good experience! We had envisioned taken a lot of jerrycans with water, canned food, tools, safety equipment and valuables with us in case of a need to go on the raft. Now you realize that in a storm with big waves you probably have very little time to deploy the raft and than detach it from Stamper as soon as you put weight in the raft. The forces on a small line will get too big and either the line will break or the raft will be damaged. So the new procedure (on paper) will be to first put all safety and valuable stuff in the raft and then depending on the situation, take on the food stuff and than jump in ourselves. Watercans will be tied together and thrown in the water besides the raft and only taken on board after detaching from Stamper.
The red thing inside is a sea anchor. Also inside are valves to pump up the raft if needed.
The rope is the one attached to Stamper. It can hold some weight but not for too long. The two pressure hoses are attached to the CO2 cilynder attached under the entrance.
This is the stuff insed the raft. Batteries start leaking in heat, a pump hose has broken and the pump has corroded. Flashlights are toys, not even LED's.
Also I noticed that the company that made the raft, Ocean Safety, on purpose has added some details to force you to have the raft serviced every three years, at a minimum cost of 1000 dollars. In my case it was 1650 dollars as I had skipped one service period. They add batteries that start leaking in the tropical heat, damaging the content of the raft. Also the ties around the raft have been designed to fall apart through rusting after three years. Once that happens water easily comes into the container of the raft further damaging the content. Actually, the raft itself is quite well built as it inflated still perfect and everything on the raft looks in a good condition. With this knowledge in mind I will not care anymore about certificated servicing, but open the raft myself after three years, throw the batteries out and add my own equipment in there of a better quality than the toys they call a pump etc. I think that may be a much better quality alternative. Also I will keep the raft inside Stamper and not outside. That way the damage of water ingress and UV will be a lot less. The price for replacing the 'toy' tools in the raft must offer a very high profit margin!