CREW’S TOP TIPS
PREPARATIONS
■ Start the planning as early as possible. Try to build relationships with the people who will be doing the crossing with you.
■ Get to know your boat well. Know how to repair everything and how all the systems work. Carry out a significant shakedown cruise to test the boat and its equipment.
■ Know your power systems and always carry a spare, fully charged battery that is disconnected from the motor. If relying on solar power, remember the day is only 10 hours with 14 hours of darkness while using batteries. If relying on wind generators, remember the wind is from the stern.
■ Know your sails. A parasail or a tradewind sail is immensely powerful and may put some strain on rigging, bowsprit and other parts of the boat. Have a plan for sailing downwind in over 30 knots of wind.
■ Know how to rig a preventer system. This year saw a broken boom (pictured) as the preventer had been fixed to the middle of the boom, not the end.
■ Prepare for chafe. Protect the halyards and guys at all points of rubbing. Be prepared to cut and replace halyards, sheets and spinnaker guys.
■ Have a comprehensive selection of professional tools and spare parts (see below), which must be stored correctly to avoid corrosion.
■ Arrive early in Las Palmas. You need to build some flexibility into your schedule. At least a month early is good so you can prepare calmly and do some repairs.
■ Not all parts are available in Las Palmas. There is delivery time (and cost) for parts to arrive. There are services in Las Palmas but they may be fully booked.
■ Start the provisioning at home. It can be less expensive and people tend to panic and buy too much at the last minute. Have plenty of tinned and canned goods aboard for an emergency – three months supply. A can compacter helps rubbish storage.
■ Even if you’re not prone to seasickness, take medication the night before at the start of the trip. This ensures a good night’s sleep and can stop you being caught off guard at the beginning of the event.
■ Drink plenty of water. Dehydration is one of the most common reasons for people feeling ill. Don’t sit in the sun for long periods. The wind keeps you cool but you can easily dehydrate without feeling it.
■ Plan a good watch system in advance: three on, five off, three on, five off, worked well for Penny Oyster. The first watch was with a buddy, receiving a handover of what’s going on for the first hour; the second hour by yourself; third hour was with the incoming watch for another handover to get them up to speed.
parasailer and we generally had an easy time. I think we sailed a shorter distance than other boats. We sailed about 2,900 miles.’
At sea, Lonneke had a doting grandfather and uncles as well as parents to help keep her amused. She liked to help with the washing up in a bucket, do various crafts and helped write a couple of messages to put in bottles that she then threw into the sea.
As for Mashal: ‘The crossing went much better than I ever imagined, also with Lonneke. I remember the day we left, I had tears and I was so scared. Then seeing her playing around, not asking about land, so happy, was wonderful. We were very lucky. I never imagined that we would cook every day, except one. I never thought that we would put the Oxley up as much, day and night. Overall I’m incredibly grateful that we had such an experience.’
NAUTITECH 44 OPEN
Peter and Natalie Hunt from Victoria BC, and their two children, daughter Sonnen, 11, and son Remy, 7, had a plan for the last few years to get a boat and go for a family adventure. They started looking for a yacht during Covid and finally bought a new Nautitech 44 Open catamaran in June through broker Max Shaw, who joined them on the ARC trip.
‘We’re on an open-ended bluewater cruising adventure. We’ll journey on as long as it continues to feel good for all four of us,’ says Peter. ‘The goal is to get to the South Pacific – it will be nice to slow down there. We may get down to New Zealand and Australia. After the Caribbean, we will head through the Panama Canal.’
In preparation, Peter and Natalie retook all the sailing courses and also chartered the same type of catamaran in the British Virgin Islands to get to know the boat. ‘It was a great way to introduce the kids to cruising as well. They’ve been doing sailing lessons since they were four in Optimist dinghies, but they were never super keen on it. And then we went to the BVI and they were like, “Oh, this is good”.’
Starting in June, they sailed from La Rochelle down the coast and into the Med to Tunisia, needing to be outside the Schengen zone. They parked the boat in Bizerte to go on a trip to see the Sahara desert. ‘It was a nice way to test a longer passage as a family,’ said Peter.
‘The kids get in a really nice rhythm aboard. They like to help a little bit on passages by driving the boat. They especially love sleeping outside on the bench. We just clip them into the jacklines. When we switch back and forth at night, they often wake up for a little bit and maybe sit out with us and look at the star constellations or see some phosphorescence and go back to sleep.’
Sonnen and Remy usually do around two hours of schooling in the morning. They also have a tutor that they connect with a couple of days a week. ‘On the crossing, we did quite a bit of school and it was really fun,’ said Natalie. ‘We did a lot of reading together and we tried to cover school topics. Remy and I had talked about tectonics and the mid-atlantic ridge and crust formation.
So we marked it in a GPS and went over it. We also watched the Blue Planet series as we were travelling over it to celebrate. It was really cool.’
With winds in the range of 18-22 knots for most of the crossing, with the odd 30-knot squall, June averaged seven knots, but hit a top speed of 17 knots one day surfing down a wave, clocking around 190 miles per day.
In preparation, Peter and Natalie upgraded their communications, including Starlink, and also the power systems – they now have 2,000W of solar panels and a generator. They also replaced the halyards and added chafe protection. They had minimal breakages on the trip and finished second in the Multihull Division B.
‘We had done about 5,000 miles and pushed the boat pretty hard before we got