Las Palmas de Gran Canaria to Port St Charles, Barbados
Start Time : 29/12/2019 08:00
Position: Las Palmas de Gran Canaria Anchorage, Canary Islands
Destination: Port St Charles, Barbados
Rhumb Line Distance: 2670nm
Day One
Check forecasts for the trip, looks as good as we could hope for!! We can
see F4-5 Easterly winds once we get to the south of Gran Canaria that should
last for at least the first 4 or 5 days. Waves building over the days but
generally from behind. So anchor raised, stowed and secured and off we go.
The plan is to follow the rhumb line course (shortest distance) since the
weather looks good.
The first 20nm we motor into bumpy seas and head winds but once we get to
the S of the island and start to turn west the wind settles at around 12-15
knts from the east so the spinnaker is raised just after midday and the
engines are turned off. Near perfect conditions, making 6knts in calm seas,
all is good on board.
Late afternoon we look at the forecasts and decide to leave the kite up
overnight, a good decision since the wind stayed around 10-12knts all night
so we made steady progress. Towards dawn the wind increased a bit so we were
making 6knts or so. Through the morning wind increased a bit more but we
still have the kite up making 7-8knts directly to our destination. At midday
Monday we hadcovered 151nm in our first 24hrs under sail – we are very happy
with that.
Catering on board is awesome with brandy laced fruit cake, melon starters
followed by beef bourguignon along with tea and treats – not much chance of
losing weight on this trip.
Distance Covered to 30/12/2019 12:00hrs 171nm (28hrs)
Position at 12:00hrs 27Deg 10.81Min North, 18 Deg 06.37 Min West
Distance Made Good to Destination : 175nm (28hrs)
Distance to Go: 2473nm
Day Two
An eventful day on board – early afternoon, we are cruising along at around
7knts with the kite up when all 4 of our fishing reels start screaming line
out!! Screw down the brakes on the reels and quickly get the sock down over
the kite to slow us down, by now one fish has snapped the line and one has
got off the lure but we still have two unhappy fish to reel in. Rich reels
his in quite quickly and it is gaffed and landed. The second fish puts up
more of a struggle, it had already stripped nearly all the line off the reel
and there was smoke coming of the reel brake. Chris and Rich combine to
slowly reel it in, eventually it is gaffed and landed – two tuna both about
10-12kg each.
While cleaning up Chris loses the bucket overboard so we start engines and
turn around for some unplanned MOB practice – not a good result when the
bucket line gets caught around the prop!! We try to free it with gaff and
knife but fail, briefly think about swimming to deal with it but sea is a
bit too rough so we decide to keep sailing and deal with it when we get a
calm period. Now it seems to have chaffed through or slipped off on its own
so we are OK.
Just before sunset we are discussing leaving the spinnaker up for the night
again when there is a big bang from up front and the spinnaker rips from the
top to about halfway down the sail, lots of fabric flapping around. We get
the sock down and recover the kite onto the trampoline and then into the
cockpit. Just time before dark to get two poles rigged and the headsails
deployed wing and wing on the poles, now sailing along comfortably at around
6knts.
The spinnaker looks to have chafed on the snuffer ring near the head of the
sail and this must have started the rip, once started it went across the
head and straight down the other side of the sail. Repairs have started this
morning and are going well, good job we have the sewing machine from making
the mainsail.
Wind eased a bit overnight but the sea state is a bit bumpier than our first
night, wind increases a bit towards dawn so we are making 6.5 to 7knts.
Through the morning of Tuesday the wind is just S of East at about 16-18knts
so we are making about 7.5knts though the seas are a bit rolly.
24hr Distance Covered to 31/12/2019 12:00 : 158nm
Position at 12:00hrs 26Deg 14.40Min North, 20 Deg 48.23 Min West
24hr Distance Made Good to Destination : 153nm
Distance to Go: 2320nm
We also have a message for Suzzie from Rosie Skye, they are having trouble
with the Iridium Go system and are not sure if messages and position reports
are being sent properly. All is well with them and if you are not getting
the expected updates it is due to electronic gremlins and not because
anything is wrong on Rosie Skye. Suzzie, please pass this info to friends
and family just to be sure everyone knows all is well.
Tuesday, December 31, 2019
Sunday, December 29, 2019
Nimrod Departs from Las Palmas
We are on our way to Barbados!!
We left Las Palmas de Gran Canaria at 0800hrs this morning with a lovely sunrise to help us on our way.
A bit of a lumpy start with F3 SE winds on the nose and a lumpy sea state to make for a bouncy start to our trip. We are motoring down the E side of Gran Canaria with the wind expected to move around to the NE and then when we turn around the south of the island the sea should be much more comfortable and behind us so life on board will be good.
We should be able to raise the sails and turn the engines off when we get to the bottom of the island – we certainly haven’t got enough fuel to motor to Barbados!!
We have Dave and Rich on board with us for the trip, as you can see everyone looks smart in Nimrod tee shirts and raring to go.
We are sailing in company with Glen, Michelle and Nathan on Rosie Skye, not sure how long we will stay in contact but it is comforting to know someone is fairly close by.
We will be posting a Blog update every couple of days from our sat phone so check back here to see how we are getting along because we will not be sending ntification emails while we are out at sea.
Looking forward to our Rum Punches in Barbados.
We left Las Palmas de Gran Canaria at 0800hrs this morning with a lovely sunrise to help us on our way.
A bit of a lumpy start with F3 SE winds on the nose and a lumpy sea state to make for a bouncy start to our trip. We are motoring down the E side of Gran Canaria with the wind expected to move around to the NE and then when we turn around the south of the island the sea should be much more comfortable and behind us so life on board will be good.
We should be able to raise the sails and turn the engines off when we get to the bottom of the island – we certainly haven’t got enough fuel to motor to Barbados!!
 |  |
| Crew Ready for the Off | Out Into the Sunrise |
We are sailing in company with Glen, Michelle and Nathan on Rosie Skye, not sure how long we will stay in contact but it is comforting to know someone is fairly close by.
 |  |
| Last View of Las Palmas | Buddy Boat - Rosie Skye |
We will be posting a Blog update every couple of days from our sat phone so check back here to see how we are getting along because we will not be sending ntification emails while we are out at sea.
Looking forward to our Rum Punches in Barbados.
Tuesday, December 24, 2019
Canary Islands
Hi all Sue here
Well the date is drawing nearer for our Atlantic crossing!! Yikes!! We have been in the Canaries now for 2 months and have been very busy provisioning and getting Nimrod in tip top condition for the crossing. My little head is starting to buzz now!!
We loved Graciosa, meeting many boats who are doing the same as us or crossing with the ARC Ralley. Surprising how many had small children onboard, I definitely wouldn’t fancy that!! We had a surprise visit from family friends Tony & Mandy, who were holidaying on Lanzarote. Had a lovely long lunch onboard Nimrod and of course a few drinkies.
We had to be in Fuerteventura for the beginning of November as we had Gaynor and Alec coming out to stay. Unfortunately this was when the wind decided to really pick up and we had a very lively sail across there. Our plan to meet them in Corralejo and sail down the coast for a few days went out the window and we went into a small Marina in Gran Tarajal instead. They hired a car for the week and we saw the island that way, we still had a great time as always.
At Point Jande there were some really inquisitive chipmunks living on the cliffs that I renamed sea squirrels, very cute things. Apparantly not well liked by the locals as they are invasive to the island and were originally brought here as pets.
I then did a quick visit back to he UK for a week to catch up with Family and Friends. It was a very manic week, including an early family Christmas and my daughter also got engaged.
Chris has been catching fish again and hopes to catch a few on our way across to the Caribbean but I have not included them in my meal plan just in case!!
As Sue mentioned above we have been working our way through a long list of things to do before we head out into the Atlantic, fortunately Nimrod is always well looked after so the boat jobs were all relatively small things – about the only major job left is to give the bottom of the boat a good clean and scrub so it is as smooth as possible before we leave. With around 3000nm to cover it is really important to have a nice clean bottom, even 1/4 knot extra speed means almost a day less on our passage time. The water temperature here is around 22 deg C, not too bad but still probably need the wetsuit for the two to three hours it takes to clean the hulls – be much nicer cleaning in the Caribbean with 28 deg water temps.
Our Crew, Rich and Dave, join us on the 28th Dec so I am anxiously checking every weather forecast to see when we can leave. Currently it looks OK for leaving on the 29th but it can all change before then. We hope to arrive in Barbados 16-20 days later, Caroline is preparing Rum Punches for our arrival!!
If you want to see where we are and when we leave then have a look at https://www.vesselfinder.com/?mmsi=235034855 or https://www.marinetraffic.com/en/ais/details/ships/shipid:5792913/mmsi:235034855/vessel:NIMROD%20OF%20MALVERN Both of these sites only show our position when we are within about 50nm of land so will not track our progress across the Atlantic.
We have a Satellite Phone on board for receiving weather forecasts and we hope to able to send a progress update to this Blog every couple of days, so check the Blog regularly to see how we are getting on.
We would like to wish all our family and friends a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, we will be seeing in the New Year out in the Atlantic and our next blog should be from Barbados!!!
Well the date is drawing nearer for our Atlantic crossing!! Yikes!! We have been in the Canaries now for 2 months and have been very busy provisioning and getting Nimrod in tip top condition for the crossing. My little head is starting to buzz now!!
We loved Graciosa, meeting many boats who are doing the same as us or crossing with the ARC Ralley. Surprising how many had small children onboard, I definitely wouldn’t fancy that!! We had a surprise visit from family friends Tony & Mandy, who were holidaying on Lanzarote. Had a lovely long lunch onboard Nimrod and of course a few drinkies.
 |  |
| Tony & Mandy Visit Nimrod | Girls in Windy Fuerteventura |
 |  |
| Stormy Shores | Sheltered Shores |
 |  |
| Chipmunk at Pointe Jande | Practice for the Atlantic |
Chris has been catching fish again and hopes to catch a few on our way across to the Caribbean but I have not included them in my meal plan just in case!!
As Sue mentioned above we have been working our way through a long list of things to do before we head out into the Atlantic, fortunately Nimrod is always well looked after so the boat jobs were all relatively small things – about the only major job left is to give the bottom of the boat a good clean and scrub so it is as smooth as possible before we leave. With around 3000nm to cover it is really important to have a nice clean bottom, even 1/4 knot extra speed means almost a day less on our passage time. The water temperature here is around 22 deg C, not too bad but still probably need the wetsuit for the two to three hours it takes to clean the hulls – be much nicer cleaning in the Caribbean with 28 deg water temps.
Our Crew, Rich and Dave, join us on the 28th Dec so I am anxiously checking every weather forecast to see when we can leave. Currently it looks OK for leaving on the 29th but it can all change before then. We hope to arrive in Barbados 16-20 days later, Caroline is preparing Rum Punches for our arrival!!
If you want to see where we are and when we leave then have a look at https://www.vesselfinder.com/?mmsi=235034855 or https://www.marinetraffic.com/en/ais/details/ships/shipid:5792913/mmsi:235034855/vessel:NIMROD%20OF%20MALVERN Both of these sites only show our position when we are within about 50nm of land so will not track our progress across the Atlantic.
We have a Satellite Phone on board for receiving weather forecasts and we hope to able to send a progress update to this Blog every couple of days, so check the Blog regularly to see how we are getting on.
We would like to wish all our family and friends a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, we will be seeing in the New Year out in the Atlantic and our next blog should be from Barbados!!!
Friday, October 25, 2019
Passage Report - Isla Culatra to Isla Graciosa, Canaries
Start Time : 20/10/2019 07:30
Position: Praca Larga Anchorage, Isla Culatra
Destination: Playa Francesca Anchorage, Isla Graciosa
Distance: 550nm
Day One
Check forecasts for the trip, mostly NW to N winds at 10-15knts occasionally up to 20knts. Ocean swell from the NW at 2m gradually decreasing towards the Canaries.
Raise anchor and raise mainsail at first light and motor sail out of the anchorage towards Barra Nova channel out of the lagoon and into the N Atlantic. One other yacht making preparations to leave as we passed.
Once out into the Atlantic we unfurled the gennaker with the full main and turned the engines off, making around 5.5knts in 8-9knts wind from the NW. Some black clouds and we passed close to a 25knt squall after a couple of hours. VHF call from Temanua, the yacht leaving the anchorage, they are heading to the same destination.
We found that a SW heading with full sail set on starboard tack is about as bad as it gets for shading our solar panels so we didn’t get as much charge as we expected and batteries were already low after a couple of cloudy days in the anchorage, will need to run the engines occasionally to top up the charge levels.
Wind picked up slowly through the day and for most of the afternoon was 15-16knts, the sea state was a bit lumpy due to the 30knt SW winds the day before. Changed headsail to the Jib late in the evening as the wind got up to near 20knts.
Distance Covered to 21/10/2019 08:00 : 165nm
Distance Made Good to Destination : 162nm
Distance to Go: 438nm
Day Two
Weather forecast predicted around 10knts from the N but the day was mostly very light winds from variable directions. Started off motorsailing to charge the batteries and make a bit of progress, then raised the kite and drifted along at 2-3knts until an approaching squall in the afternoon meant the kite was dropped. Then we had little to no wind for 2 or 3 hrs so drifted along at barely over 1knt. The breeze finally settled in the early hours of the morning and we were able to make 7knts, then we sailed into a 25knt squall with heavy rain. Only lasted about 15mins but was pretty unpleasant.
Decent sailing afterwards with settled wind up to about 15knts and good boat speed around 7knts.
24hr Distance Covered to 22/10/2019 08:00 : 120nm
24hr Distance Made Good to Destination : 115nm
Distance to Go: 273nm
Day Three
A good day sailing with wind around 15-20knts from the N, couple of reefs in the main and Jib or gennaker had us doing 8knts for most of the day and into the evening. Still quite a few squalls around so the radar was very useful in picking them up and trying to dodge around them, we only ever skirted the edges so conditions were OK.
Wind in the evening was still 15-18knts with a fairly confused and lumpy sea making it a bit difficult on board. The wind started to ease in the hours up to dawn and the sea also started to smooth out.
24hr Distance Covered to 23/10/2019 08:00 : 170nm
24hr Distance Made Good to Destination : 165nm
Distance to Go: 108nm
Day Four
Wind around 10-12knts from the NNE at the start of the day so pulled the kite up and set course directly to destination. Hooked two pan sized Mahi-Mahi just as we got the kite up, landed both safely so tonight’s meal is all sorted.
Lightish wind all day so sailed with the kite at 4.5-6knts all day, sea much smoother so a very pleasant day on board. A quick visit from a small pod of dolphins late afternoon. Wind increased a little towards evening so dropped kite and mainsail - changed to twin headsails for last 40nm and down to gennaker for the final 7-8nm due to wind shift.
Dropped anchor in Playa Francesca at 0400, 24/10/19. Very busy in the anchorage and no moonlight so anchored in fairly deep water for the night, moved further in later in the morning.
Total Distance Sailed 567nm, route distance 550nm
Total Time en-route : 3 days 20hrs
Total Engine Hours : 8.2hrs, 4.1hrs per engine
Average Passage Speed : 6.0knts
July to October
Hi all
Sorry the blog is very late this time, it has been a very busy few weeks!! I am wirting it on passage to Lanzarote, our longest sail yet. Getting in practice for the big one.
At the end of June we both went back to the UK for my nieces wedding. What a fantastic day that was, it was almost perfect appart from my daughter going into hospital that day and missing it all!! It was lovely to catch up with family and friends and the champagne flowed all day and all night!! Liz, my niece, looked absolutely stunning and my grandaughter was a little star.
We returned to Sardinia beginning of July along with Caroline and Richard afer a very frantic 2 days clearing up after the wedding!! we were all ready for a rest. We had left Nimrod on a mooring buoy in Porto Pozzo, a realy nce place to visit. We came here 7 years ago and were made most welcome by a lovley couple Jenny & Tito. They had a boat and a beautiful house ashore which they invited us to and made us feel part of their family. We promised to visit if we came back this way but sadly Tito died 2 years ago. Jenny was still there waiting on her Jetty with big hugs and smiles to greet us. The plan was to sail around Sardinia and Corsica and then cross to Majorca. We had 3 weeks to play with so what could go wrong!! The weather!! We sailed across to the Maddalena Islands for a few days then across to Corsica and eventually back to Sardinia. Ended up with Caroline flying home from Sardinia and Richard stayed on a few extra days and we managed a night passage to Menorca, which was what he wanted to do in preparation for our bigger crossing the end of this year.
We still all enjoyed our 3 weeks together and did some lovely hikes and exploring as we always do. The Cork Museum was fascinating and we visited the oldest olive tree, estimated to be between 3000 and 4000 years old. It’s quite ironic that 7 years ago they came out to Majorca intending to cross to Sardinia with us and we didnt make it that way either!!
At the end of July my daughter and her partner Pete and my grandaughter came to visit to Santa Ponsa. Courtney celebrated her 11th birthday onboard, the last time I was with her on her actual birthday was when she was 1!! We had a really lovely time with them but the end of the holiday had a dramatic end. My daughter hadnt been feeling well the last couple of days and ended up being met by paramedics and ambulance at Manchester airport. She spent the night on resus ward with multiple clots on both lungs and legs and it was a very fightening time. I flew home the next day to be with her and look after Courtney. She is recovering well now but a very lucky girl to have survived that and I have a few more grey hairs and wrinkles!!
So after my unexpected trip home for 10 days I few back into Alicante where Chris had sailed Nimrod to in my absence. We were now on a mission to get to the Guadiana River where Chris planned to make a new mainsail, quite, quite mad!! The plan was to anchor in the river at the bottom of our friends garden and set up a workshop there. Isn’t it nice to have really good friends, especially with a pool and bar in their garden!! Thank You Claire and Eddie
I am now going to let Chris tell you about the making of the mainsail. I am very proud of him as it was an awful lot of hard work, I was just the little helper and we also had other friends who arrived to help us just at the right time. Thank you Gilly & John
So – how to make a mainsail in a Spanish Garden?
The mainsail on Nimrod was the original so was nearly 16 years old and had a good few patches and the sailcloth was very weak and easily torn – it was pretty clear we needed a new one so time for some research. Obviously most people would have just got a few quotes from Sailmakers and choosen the one that they felt was best, but where is the challenge in that? The original sail was made by Jeckells and talking to them they were amazed that the sail had actually lasted 16 years, we must have looked after it very well.
Prices for a new sail were in the £5,500 to £7,000 range depending on specification etc so lets have a look at making our own – how difficult can it be? You only need to stitch a few panels of sailcloth together, add in some corner fittings, reef points and battens and you have a new sail – it was actually close to that simple, just did’t realise how difficult it is to manouvre 65 sq m of sailcloth on a sewing table that was not quite big enough.
First thing to do is get the new sail designed so we took very careful measurements of the existing, drew up a specification and sent all the info to Ultimate Sails. They produced the sail design on their state of the art software and we get an assembly plan and a cutting file for the sailcloth. Very simple process and only about £180 – good value we thought.
Next step is to get the sailcloth cut to the cutting file specification. We used Contender Sails for this and they were very efficient. We sent them 2 rolls of sailcloth from our supplier and they then cut all the individual panels on their computer controlled laser cutting bed, panels were also plotted with identification numbers, joint lines, reef points and luff connection positions. They packed everything up into 2 big boxes and shipped it to Spain all for around £300.
So we now have two boxes of sailcloth panels, batten pocket strips, edging tapes etc, all ready to sew together. The sail was made up of 12 main panels, another 60 panels to make up the corner and reef point patches plus the strips for 5 batten pockets and the tapes around the edges of the sail – basically a big jigsaw puzzle.
Now we needed a sail loft and a sewing machine and a big open space. Friends Claire and Eddie have a Finca on the banks of the Guadiana River with loads of space and they were great hosts while we were there. Claire and Sue went off walking one day and met the neighbours who turned out to have about a dozen 8x4 sheets of OSB and some trestles – perfect start for the sail loft. The next neighbour had also heard about some locals who had a large sewing machine that was free to a good home.
Eddie had a good few trestles and frames so the sail loft table was put together and covered with a couple of tarpaulins to make it smooth and slippy for sliding the sail around on, the garden was also on a slight slope that meant some gravity assistance for feeding things through the sewing machine. We had already ordered a heavy duty zig-zag sewing machine for the project but we also collected the free machine from Sam and David, this was a very heavy duty Seiko machine that would effortlessly sew through 14 layers of sailcloth and a couple of thicknesses of webbing, ideal for the multiple layer corners etc. We also used our existing mainsail as a sunshade cover over the whole sewing table, this was brilliant since it would have been impossible to work in the Spanish sun without it, daytime temperatures were mid to high 30’s so the adjacent pool and bar were great.
Then it was just a matter of assembling all the patches and panels to make the sail. We started from the head of the sail and worked towards the foot, things got progressively more difficult as more panels and patches were stitched together. Sewing the last panels on meant feeding through about 6m length of sail with all the rest of the sail folded up on the table to slide past at the same time, this needed 3 people to keep it all under control but it worked pretty well. The biggest job was having to unroll the sail from how it had been assembled and re-roll it length ways to allow us to stitch on the edging tapes etc. We had to take down the old suncover sail and spread it in the garden so we could unroll the new sail on it and then roll it up the other way.
After something like 2 weeks of sewing we had a complete sail ready for fitting – the moment of truth!! On a nice calm morning the sail was hoisted up the mast and connected to all the fittings, it fitted perfectly and looked brilliant. The shape of the sail looked great and barely a wrinkle to be seen, it was to be another 3 weeks or so before we finally got out to sea and were able to actually test the sail but it seems to work extremely well, very pleased with it.
Was it worth it? It was certainly a major project and about the limit of what you could do without full size industrial sewing machines and large sail loft space and it was an awful lot of work. However with computer design, cutting and plotting the sail is exactly the same shape as we would have got from a proffesional sailmaker, certainly some of the stitching would have have been neater and more consistent from a sailmaker but otherwise not much difference. The main problem we had was actually feeding the cloth through the machine at a constant rate to get nice straight and consistent stitches, the sailcloth is very slippy so the foot of the machine does not grip it efficiently and the cloth slides around a bit too much causing uneven stitches, broken thread and bent needles, we used about 40 needles overall.
Finally it was a great achievment and we saved about £2,500 even after buying an expensive sewing machine to do the job – so now we have the sewing machine for new headsails??
Whilst I was Chris’ little helper I also found some other activities to keep me busy. Picking grapes and all the follow on preparation for wine makeing was great fun if a tad messy!! We visited many old friends and made many new friends all who contributed to making our extended stay up the Guadiana River a brilliant time. We apologise for any hangovers we caused but it was all great fun amidst the hard work. Thank you to everyone involved in helping and partying with us and we will be back one day!!!
We finally managed to make our way out of the river as it was time to move on. Culatra was our next stop, where we waited for the perfect weather window to cross to the Canaries. Ha Ha!! if only these forecasts could be believed. It was a very mixed crossing with all sorts thrown at us but we survived and we even caught two Mahi Mahi along the way. It was a great experience for our next long passage across the Atlantic to Barbados. Menus all planned, just provision shopping to do. Getting excited now!!
Sorry the blog is very late this time, it has been a very busy few weeks!! I am wirting it on passage to Lanzarote, our longest sail yet. Getting in practice for the big one.
At the end of June we both went back to the UK for my nieces wedding. What a fantastic day that was, it was almost perfect appart from my daughter going into hospital that day and missing it all!! It was lovely to catch up with family and friends and the champagne flowed all day and all night!! Liz, my niece, looked absolutely stunning and my grandaughter was a little star.
 |  |
| Wonderful Day | My little star |
We still all enjoyed our 3 weeks together and did some lovely hikes and exploring as we always do. The Cork Museum was fascinating and we visited the oldest olive tree, estimated to be between 3000 and 4000 years old. It’s quite ironic that 7 years ago they came out to Majorca intending to cross to Sardinia with us and we didnt make it that way either!!
 |  |
| Cork Museum, Olive Tree and Valley of the Moon | Chilling and Hiking |
 |  |
| Family having fun in the sun | A beautiful mermaid onboard |
 |  |
| Nimrod | Pool Bar |
 |  |
| Busy, busy | The Beast |
The mainsail on Nimrod was the original so was nearly 16 years old and had a good few patches and the sailcloth was very weak and easily torn – it was pretty clear we needed a new one so time for some research. Obviously most people would have just got a few quotes from Sailmakers and choosen the one that they felt was best, but where is the challenge in that? The original sail was made by Jeckells and talking to them they were amazed that the sail had actually lasted 16 years, we must have looked after it very well.
Prices for a new sail were in the £5,500 to £7,000 range depending on specification etc so lets have a look at making our own – how difficult can it be? You only need to stitch a few panels of sailcloth together, add in some corner fittings, reef points and battens and you have a new sail – it was actually close to that simple, just did’t realise how difficult it is to manouvre 65 sq m of sailcloth on a sewing table that was not quite big enough.
First thing to do is get the new sail designed so we took very careful measurements of the existing, drew up a specification and sent all the info to Ultimate Sails. They produced the sail design on their state of the art software and we get an assembly plan and a cutting file for the sailcloth. Very simple process and only about £180 – good value we thought.
Next step is to get the sailcloth cut to the cutting file specification. We used Contender Sails for this and they were very efficient. We sent them 2 rolls of sailcloth from our supplier and they then cut all the individual panels on their computer controlled laser cutting bed, panels were also plotted with identification numbers, joint lines, reef points and luff connection positions. They packed everything up into 2 big boxes and shipped it to Spain all for around £300.
So we now have two boxes of sailcloth panels, batten pocket strips, edging tapes etc, all ready to sew together. The sail was made up of 12 main panels, another 60 panels to make up the corner and reef point patches plus the strips for 5 batten pockets and the tapes around the edges of the sail – basically a big jigsaw puzzle.
Now we needed a sail loft and a sewing machine and a big open space. Friends Claire and Eddie have a Finca on the banks of the Guadiana River with loads of space and they were great hosts while we were there. Claire and Sue went off walking one day and met the neighbours who turned out to have about a dozen 8x4 sheets of OSB and some trestles – perfect start for the sail loft. The next neighbour had also heard about some locals who had a large sewing machine that was free to a good home.
Eddie had a good few trestles and frames so the sail loft table was put together and covered with a couple of tarpaulins to make it smooth and slippy for sliding the sail around on, the garden was also on a slight slope that meant some gravity assistance for feeding things through the sewing machine. We had already ordered a heavy duty zig-zag sewing machine for the project but we also collected the free machine from Sam and David, this was a very heavy duty Seiko machine that would effortlessly sew through 14 layers of sailcloth and a couple of thicknesses of webbing, ideal for the multiple layer corners etc. We also used our existing mainsail as a sunshade cover over the whole sewing table, this was brilliant since it would have been impossible to work in the Spanish sun without it, daytime temperatures were mid to high 30’s so the adjacent pool and bar were great.
Then it was just a matter of assembling all the patches and panels to make the sail. We started from the head of the sail and worked towards the foot, things got progressively more difficult as more panels and patches were stitched together. Sewing the last panels on meant feeding through about 6m length of sail with all the rest of the sail folded up on the table to slide past at the same time, this needed 3 people to keep it all under control but it worked pretty well. The biggest job was having to unroll the sail from how it had been assembled and re-roll it length ways to allow us to stitch on the edging tapes etc. We had to take down the old suncover sail and spread it in the garden so we could unroll the new sail on it and then roll it up the other way.
After something like 2 weeks of sewing we had a complete sail ready for fitting – the moment of truth!! On a nice calm morning the sail was hoisted up the mast and connected to all the fittings, it fitted perfectly and looked brilliant. The shape of the sail looked great and barely a wrinkle to be seen, it was to be another 3 weeks or so before we finally got out to sea and were able to actually test the sail but it seems to work extremely well, very pleased with it.
Was it worth it? It was certainly a major project and about the limit of what you could do without full size industrial sewing machines and large sail loft space and it was an awful lot of work. However with computer design, cutting and plotting the sail is exactly the same shape as we would have got from a proffesional sailmaker, certainly some of the stitching would have have been neater and more consistent from a sailmaker but otherwise not much difference. The main problem we had was actually feeding the cloth through the machine at a constant rate to get nice straight and consistent stitches, the sailcloth is very slippy so the foot of the machine does not grip it efficiently and the cloth slides around a bit too much causing uneven stitches, broken thread and bent needles, we used about 40 needles overall.
Finally it was a great achievment and we saved about £2,500 even after buying an expensive sewing machine to do the job – so now we have the sewing machine for new headsails??
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| Looking Good | Maybe a New Career!! |
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| Grape picking and pressing | Fun times |
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| Sunrise on leaving Culatra | Mahi Mahi |
Wednesday, May 29, 2019
Hi all Sue here
Winter is over once again and Nimrod is on the move. After yet another amazing winter with our cruising friends old and new. It has been a hectic winter with Chris completing many jobs and getting Nimrod ready for our next BIG adventure.
I went back to the UK for 3 weeks in December to spend time with my family and have a wonderful Christmas with them all. That left Chris free to get on with some messy jobs and no little person tidying up behind him!! I took my Grandaughter, Courtney, to see Elf the musical and we did get a little obsessed with it all as you can see from the photos!!
When I returned to Roccella we then went to visit our friends up the Guadiana Claire and Eddie and Jana and James. had a lovely week with them and it’s great to see what both couples are achieving in their new lifestyles on land. we will visit them again in September but along with Nimrod this time. It has been 7 years since we were last there with Nimrod.
Then it was back to work and of course a few BBQs and parties along the way. We celebated Ladies day in style on the beach by the Marina and I also took a little trip to Bologna with my sister and friends as an early start to my 60th Birthday celebrations.
I can assure you that Chris has worked etremely hard on Nimrod this winter and I have done my bit and partied very hard!! Well you ae only 60 once and it was great fun. I had one small party onboard Nimrod and a larger party which my wonderful Marina friends organised for me.
The theme was Hats On for Sues 60th and my present was 60 bottles of Bubbly!! they obviously know me too well. Storing it all was a bit of a challenge, good job Chris had replaced our big old batteries with Lithium ones!! Don’t think that’s quite what he had in mind for the extra space created!!
Anyway enough of all that frivolity it was time to knuckle down and do some polishing, waxing, sorting lockers out and supply shopping as time was fast approaching for us to leave. 15th May we cast off those Marina lines said goodbye to friends, always the hardest part, and headed for the Aeolian Islands. Vulcano Island was our stop after negotiating the Messina Straits. There are 7 Volcanic Islands all very different to each other. A hike up to the Volcano Crator on Vulcano was a very smelly but beautiful experience!! Especially walking through the Fumaroles, couldnt get rid of the smell of sulpher on me for ages, I could even taste it!!
The next Island was Panarea, a lot smaller and very quiet. It didnt take us long to explore!! then we crossed to Stromboli where we did a night sail past as it was meant to be awesome at night. Think we picked a quiet night and it was difficult to try and capture the flames coming out of the top from so far down below. We were rewarded for our effort by waking up to a boat covered in gritty black volcanic dust!! had to get power washer out to remove it all.
Time to move on again and we have 70 miles to do to coast of Sicily. Motoring at the moment as no wind at all but we have been accompanied by our favourite playful friends. Never tire of seeing them. Thats it for now, next blog we will hopefully be in Sardinia
Winter is over once again and Nimrod is on the move. After yet another amazing winter with our cruising friends old and new. It has been a hectic winter with Chris completing many jobs and getting Nimrod ready for our next BIG adventure.
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| Vikki, Sue and Courtney on the way to see Elf |
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| Christmas Eve and Elf pyjamas!! |
When I returned to Roccella we then went to visit our friends up the Guadiana Claire and Eddie and Jana and James. had a lovely week with them and it’s great to see what both couples are achieving in their new lifestyles on land. we will visit them again in September but along with Nimrod this time. It has been 7 years since we were last there with Nimrod.
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| Day Out Hiking |
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| Jana, Claire and Sue |
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| Sisters in Bologna |
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| Bubbly is out for the Ladies |
I can assure you that Chris has worked etremely hard on Nimrod this winter and I have done my bit and partied very hard!! Well you ae only 60 once and it was great fun. I had one small party onboard Nimrod and a larger party which my wonderful Marina friends organised for me.
 |
| Party Night on Nimrod |
 |
| Lovely Ladies Who Organised Parties |
The theme was Hats On for Sues 60th and my present was 60 bottles of Bubbly!! they obviously know me too well. Storing it all was a bit of a challenge, good job Chris had replaced our big old batteries with Lithium ones!! Don’t think that’s quite what he had in mind for the extra space created!!
 |
| Even The Men Wore Hats |
 |
| 60 Bottles of Bubbly |
Anyway enough of all that frivolity it was time to knuckle down and do some polishing, waxing, sorting lockers out and supply shopping as time was fast approaching for us to leave. 15th May we cast off those Marina lines said goodbye to friends, always the hardest part, and headed for the Aeolian Islands. Vulcano Island was our stop after negotiating the Messina Straits. There are 7 Volcanic Islands all very different to each other. A hike up to the Volcano Crator on Vulcano was a very smelly but beautiful experience!! Especially walking through the Fumaroles, couldnt get rid of the smell of sulpher on me for ages, I could even taste it!!
 |
| view of the other islands from top of Crater |
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| Chris in front of the Fumaroles |
The next Island was Panarea, a lot smaller and very quiet. It didnt take us long to explore!! then we crossed to Stromboli where we did a night sail past as it was meant to be awesome at night. Think we picked a quiet night and it was difficult to try and capture the flames coming out of the top from so far down below. We were rewarded for our effort by waking up to a boat covered in gritty black volcanic dust!! had to get power washer out to remove it all.
 |
| Approaching Stromboli |
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| Life on Panarea |
Time to move on again and we have 70 miles to do to coast of Sicily. Motoring at the moment as no wind at all but we have been accompanied by our favourite playful friends. Never tire of seeing them. Thats it for now, next blog we will hopefully be in Sardinia
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| More Dolphins |
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| Dolphins Swimming With Nimrod |
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