Wollombi II: Riva di Traiano

10 June, after procrastinating (for 2.5 hours), on whether, I should wait for the wind to die down or not - I went for it. As I have docked in worse conditions and undocking was easier - I set off and I confirmed I had been wasting time. I left the harbour and the swell gave me a nice welcome as I had to turn into it. The winds were round the 20kts, I put the fenders away, and motored till I was clear of some rocks (wanted to avoid going full retard). After clearing the rocks, I put the sails up, with 2 reefs in place as I was expecting the wind to be in the high 20s. I wasn't disappointed, no sooner had I put the sails up we were off, doing a very nice 7kts.. Then I got in the shadow of a hill and winds 4-5kts WTF.. I waited and drifted past the hill and got the wind again and we were off again.. I saw a boat that had been hugging the shore for some time, the moment he got the full wind, he was promptly rounded out a couple of times, as he had his full set of sails up.

The wind continued to build and we were soon flying, it was consistently above mid 20 and touching 30. I reefed in my jib just past the 4th reef till there was just a touch of weather helm and enjoyed the ride. I was on a beam/broad reach and going parallel to the waves and just a slight angle to them and we were slicing through them the boat hardly budged. Got some water going over the bow, water running down the sides and some spray back at the helm. The top speed I got was 9.5 kts and that was with 33kts of wind.

The fun soon died down and we were back to a sedate 7kts.. A hour later the wind died down, as forecast so I had to motor. After altering course, the wind was directly from behind, so I put my sails away and got ready to motor the last stretch. With 20 and change miles to go, out of curiosity, I put up my jib (the wind was blowing 12kts) my speed went up by a knot to 1.5 knots, so I kept it up and made use of the freebie.

With about -11 miles to go the wind dropped below 6kts, so I had to stow my jib. The two hours I had spent debating on leaving port - well, they provided me with another experience, entering and docking in the dark. That went ok.. After snugging up the boat, some chow and bedtime.. Next Day Rome!

Should I stay or should I go...

I took this while deciding I also updated the blog, had a cup of coffee...

That was level (the swell put the arteest tilt)

The boat got rounded out through the gap - he did shoot across it

Jib out to help the motor..

I put the motor in idle and with the jib alone I could do 5.5kts, but I decided to motor as I had some distance to go and I didn't fancy a night docking (I got one anyway :-)). The following shots were taken of the sun sneaking away for the night..