Author: Yrvind

Many of the sailors who arrive here from Portugal complain about seasickness. Some of them even give upp and take a airplane to the Caribian where they join the boat.

There is also much talk about seasick pills.

Now I think that the sailors should show some compassion for their pour body. It is used to be on land where they nowadays walk on flat even surfaces. Then suddenly the owner decides without giving their body time to adapt that now they are going to put him on a mowing boat.

The body of course have spent years finding the fine balance needed for walking upright using all his senses to do a good job.

Obviusly he needs some time when suddenly conflicting information from different senses has to be processed in the brain.

For most people the trip from Portugal to here only takes a few days. That is not enough. At least a weak is needed for most people. To really be at one with the sea I think at least a month is needed. Then the sailors body can do a good work of providing his owner with the desired functions and everone will be happy.

This is one reason why I like long passages and why I do not fraction a good long haul into many misirable small jumps. Luckily I do not suffer from seasickness but there are many more things to consider like that it takes time to shift protein building new muscles and learning to behave in the marine enviroment.

Regards Yrvind

My blisters are shrinking and the weather seems to have settled. I hope to leave on wendsday.

This upsets many peaple. They tell me that the trade wind does not start to blow before the end of november when the ARC starts. That is not so. They are wrong and ignorant. This is whats happens when people mowes in gropes like the ARC. They do not study the fundamentals. The trade blows the whole year. It moves north and south with the sun. In fact it is much better to leave now when the trade is still upp here becouse then you follow the trades south and can take advantage of them all the way. The picture is from The Admiralitys Lifeboat Chart showing the upper and lower limits of the trade. Click on it two times to enlarge it.

Regards Yrvind

This is two pictures from a drive around Porto Santo.

I am sitting at a wifi spot outside the marina office. Obviusly a lot of nice yachtsmen is helping me tp put pictures into my webb-page.

Regards Yrvind.

Me scrubbing the bottom.

Regards Yrvind

This where my broken tooth got grinded down and filled.

Regards Yrvind.

One blister and the doctor fixing it. Last night was more peaceful with my cabin heavily sprayed with pesticides.

Regards Yrvind

To day Sylvie a nurse from a french yacht remowed the bandage from the first blister. It looks good and most of the redness are gone. The antibiotic cure will be finished tomorrow, me then having swallowed all the pills in the little box.

Unfortunatly two new bites on the left foot has started new blisters and tonight I got ten or twenty more on my back. Life in harbour is to dangerous.

Today I went to the supermarket and against my philosophy bought insecticides. The biggest most powerful can I could find. Its a question of survival. I nearly emptied the can in my cabin. Bystanders told me that if the bugs do not kill me then the insecticides will.

I will do a little ventilation tonight before I go to bed. To be continued…

Regards Yrvind.

My antibiotics cure will be finished on saturday. However Anne one of the sailing doctors told me that it is prudent to wait with departure two to three days after that. Monday or thusday will therefore be possible departure days.

Luckily the GRIB-files look good for now. However one should not trust them completely. In fact one should not trust anyone or anything completely except the sea.

I have heard from different sources that the real wind speed is 20%, 50% and even up to 100% faster than shown by the GRIB. Remembering that the wind force increases with the square of the speed the forces are respectivly 44%, 225% and 400% stronger than what one is made to belive.

Especially the wind speed of hurricanes are underestimated because the cover a relatively small area compared to the GRIB-net.

Fortunatly small boats have less to fear from hurricanes than big ones becouse they atract much smaller forces. Especially my boat being very small, being home made and of epoxy  and with much carbon fibre and thick heavy Divinycell have nothing to fear unless very close to a lee shore.

Less good this night I had a visit from an other mousquito. I hope these bites will not repeat my previus problems and delay departure. The sea is a much safer place I long to get going.

This is the sail arrangement for downwind sailing. Note the boom is foreward of the shroud. It is out more than 120 degrees. This makes for stable downwind running. Only problem it takes time to change to the other side. It also reduces changes of unintentional gibes. Therefore next boat will have unstayed masts.

Regards Yrvind. Thanks Beppe webbmaster for help with inserting the picture. One day hopefully it will get into my head.

Today started with me getting help from Tim Rohnen on the German Yacht MAMITI. He is a nurse and helped me to change the antibiotics on my blister. He did a very professional job and it felt secure to be in his hands.

In the afternoon Luis Camacho from Funchal Madeira showed me the western part of the island from his car. Yesterday he and his wife Susana had given me dinner and on the way to his house he had shown me the more wild eastern part of Porto Santo. I liked it much. I prefered it to the western part. Sadly the doktor has told me that I must rest my leg and should not walk othervise it would be a nice excursion for other days.

I have a problem pillow. I bought it at JYSK in my home town Västervik just before leaving. The prices at JYSK are cheap. My pillow was made in China. It did not cost much. Previusly I had bought a simular one to my bed in my flat. Unfortunatly feathers kept coming out of it.

The problem with the new pillow was that even more feathers was coming out of it and at a faster rate. According to the laws of nature the feathers came out with the sharp pointed end first. It irritating my soft head and disturbed my sleep and dreams.

Before going to sleep every night I therefore pull out as many feathers as I can see, maybee ten feathers every night. The pillow is obviusly getting thinner and thinner.

As an investigater in the mysteries of life I wonder if I will keep loosing feathers at the same linear rate.

Also as the pillow is getting thinner and thinner very slovly I wonder if I will have time to adapt to harder and harder headrest and when finally reaching Martinique I may not even need a pillow any more allowing me to lead a more simple life and a more uncomplicated life.

Regards Yrvind