A bolt of lightning zapped the sea about one mile away. The momentary illumination enabled me to see that the waves were starting to get larger, and chaotic. A second flash, this one muzzled behind the clouds, lit up the sails and I could see that the jib needed trimming; the wind was starting to move from the southwest to the west. A wave slapped the bow and the phosphorescence exploded in the spray and washed aft along the deck. Fascinated by the spectacle, I glanced off the stern to watch the glow streaming off the rudders. Another jagged streak of lightening hit close-by and there was an instantaneous, ear-shattering blast of thunder. It started to rain, hard.

Of the 25-odd times that I had crossed the Gulfstream, all the passages, with the exception of two, had been amazingly smooth; I sensed this one would be interesting. I have always found the Gulfstream a fascinating place. Said to move more water than all the world's rivers combined, the stream lies about 250 miles south of New England and can vary in width from about 60 to 100 miles. The significant temperature difference between Gulfstream waters and Continental Shelf waters to the north can intensify weather systems, and the three to four knots of generally easterly moving current can produce significant, confused waves in any strong winds; in easterly or northeasterly gales, with the wind counter to the current, the stream can be treacherous.

On the first leg of the Bermuda 1-2, the solo leg, I did not even know I was in the stream except that the compass and course over the ground showed a 30 degree discrepancy and the water temperature had reached an incredible 85 degrees. I was now on the second leg of the race, the double-handed part; my crewmate, Fred Boursier was down below, attempting sleep. According to a three-day-old Gulfstream chart, we had just entered the southern edge of the stream in a position slightly east of the rhumbline from Bermuda to Newport. The current on the way north would generally be against us and pushing us to the east, so we had picked a spot for transit of the stream that seemed to be the narrowest point, roughly 60 miles wide.

Earlier in the day, I had buzzed John Johnstone on the satphone; he had relayed that we were in about fifth place overall, with two boats dead ahead and the others directly behind or slightly to the east and west. In the Mini Transat Race, any sort of phone on the boat would get you banned from the class for life; in the Bermuda 1-2, it was required gear for the Minis and those shoreside were able to relay any information that was publicly available over the internet. John had also indicated that NOAA weather reports were still showing a rather large low pressure system, measuring 970 millibars, parking on the rhumbline.

The race had been delayed for one day to try and avoid sending us into the worst part of the storm. Now it seemed that we would hit it head on, potentially battling it out for three days; winds were predicted to be 25 to 30 knots, with gusts to 45. Initially, there seemed like a possibility of trying to get out to the east, then pushing hard to the north and picking up easterlies and then northeasterlies around the top of the low, though the storm was forecast to move to the rhumbline position rather quickly once it left the coast, meaning the whole fleet would be dealing with northerlies and northwesterlies, upwind to the finish. An area of light air was predicted before the weather started to turn ugly. Minis are designed for reaching and running. Upwind, in a gale, in big waves, for three days? I watched the phosphorescence and tried not to think about it.

I stared at the instruments, trying to see if we were still fetching Newport, about 350 degrees. The backlighting seemed to be worse than I had remembered; as I leaned forward to get a better view, the boom swung over my head and the mainsheet hit me on the arm. Puzzled, I looked forward to see the jib back-winded. On a dark night with no moon and stars, it is very easy to get disoriented, rather quickly. There have been countless times where I was convinced the boat had not changed course; no sense of leaning or momentum shift, the only way of knowing was by looking at the compass, and if you're tired enough, to the point of hallucinations, it can be relatively easy to convince yourself that the compass is lying. Steering by digital compass can also be rather difficult, and in a moment of confusion, it can be hard to get your bearings back and understand which way you strayed off course. The boat slowed to a stop and started to go in reverse. I yelled for Fred and grabbed the handheld card compass off the cabin house bulkhead; we were headed 180 degrees, back to Bermuda. We released the sails and I attempted to get the boat back on course, feeling rather stupid about my steering screw-up. There was no wind, though; we had sailed into the middle of a thunderstorm cell.

The rain became severe and lightning dropped from the low clouds every ten seconds. Good common sense practice in these conditions is to go below and stay away from the mast and metal objects, but my mast is not grounded, so below in a tight, wet space was probably not a great refuge if lightning struck. On two other occasions, one with Rod Johnstone on the boat during a race in France and the other in the doldrums in the Mini Transat, I had time to imagine some scenario where a strike would wander around the inside of the boat, finally blowing a hole through the bottom to escape to the sea. This in fact happened to a Mini in the Mediterranean, the boat a total loss, but the crew on deck made it safely into a liferaft. When I sailed with Rod, we hit numerous storms cells with dead air. We took advantage of all the light from the lightning bolts to change sails repeatedly and play every little shift, opening miles on our competition; although dancing around the deck and hanging onto halyards and shrouds might not be the best program in those conditions, either. Fred and I sat tight in the cockpit, repeatedly trimming and easing sails, watching the speed over the ground and hoping for something other than .3 knots to the south.

Glimmers of daylight would brighten the clouds at around 430 Eastern Daylight Time, and it was just about then, after one hour of doing circles, that the breeze filled in out of the west-southwest; it came on rather quickly. With any luck, we would avoid a few squall lines on the horizon and stay in the steady breeze, getting through the Gulfstream well before sunset. Fred took over the helm and I went below, hoping to find sleep on a wet bag of sails. I had switched to my drysuit from foul weather gear the day before and now I would basically live in the thing, 24 hours a day. It was a major process getting out of the gear, and down below in a boat you cannot stand up in, living in a space about four feet by six feet that is constantly wet and often moving abruptly, the exercise of taking this stuff off and putting it on again can totally wear you out. The thermal underwear I had on under the suit was the last bit of dry clothing on board, so it made no sense exposing this kit to the harsh elements inside the cabin.

I sponged up water in the bilges for ten minutes, ate a couple cereal bars, transferred water out of large jerry cans into smaller drinking bottles, then curled up in a ball on a wet spinnaker. For ten minutes I would not move, refusing to budge despite something hard jabbing me in the back. It was the anchor, which was stuffed in a duffle. I cursed, mumbled my friend Thomas's favorite words at sea, "People do this for pleasure" and jammed the anchor duffle in the back corner of the boat. Water seemed to be in all of the aft spaces, so I sponged some more before lying down again. This time I packed more wet spinnakers to windward, stretched out full length, and half slept until the boat lurched sideways off a wave, knocking the lower half of my body against the keel. I played this game for 40 minutes and gave up. I fired off the small Jetboil camping burner, boiled some water and made an incredibly powerful, awful-tasting cup of coffee. The coffee gave me an instant jolt and I no longer cared that the last two hours off-watch had basically produced no sleep; hell, it was like every other off-watch - housekeeping, occasionally weather and navigating, sometimes repairs, food periodically, lame attempts at sleep, usually followed by a nasty cup of instant coffee. At least there were two of us on board, so it was possible to be below and not have to worry about jumping on deck to deal with an autopilot that had freaked out.

The real serious solo sailors will not drink coffee because it interrupts their natural rhythm, cycle and routine. I could possibly see this on something like an Open 60 around-the-world boat, but on a Mini - a 21-foot sled not much bigger than a Suburban - there is no rhythm or routine. It's a constantly changing, often violent world, where most everything is shoot-from-the-hip. I have often found that sleep is something I generally learn to live without. If I manage, somehow, to get about two hours of sleep each day, basically with 20-minute catnaps and falling asleep while steering, I can hold off the hallucinations for at least four or five days.

I clambered on deck and noticed that Fred was steering with two hands, pulling hard on the tiller as the boat lurched and rolled; I glanced to windward and noticed the waves had grown extremely large, 15 to 20 feet, and they were starting to come from multiple directions. Some were from the southwest, others from the west and an occasional swell pushed in from the northeast; the bigger waves were starting to break. The sun was poking through, so the sea was bright blue. It was a spectacular, though slightly intimidating scene. I scrambled forward and put a reef in the jib; we were now sailing with a double-reefed main and a reefed solent. I took over the steering and was surprised at how much weather helm there still was.

Acadia is so fat that is has two rudders. I glanced nervously towards the stern and saw that the windward rudder was kicked out of the water; the starboard rudder was laboring away to keep the boat on course. I had broken the starboard rudder on the first leg of the race, during a spinnaker round-up. For four years, the rudders had withstood countless round-ups, round-downs, and loads from sliding down waves in reverse; during that particular round-up, one had finally had enough.

Rudder damage is one of the major breakdowns that prevent boats from finishing the Mini Transat, so I was thankful this had happened in this race and not halfway to Brazil. For the remainder of the first leg, every time I tacked or gybed the boat, I had to lower all sails and swap the remaining good rudder from one side to the other, typically a 20-minute process, longer if there was a short chop. I had given Fred a bell on the satphone the night of the breakage, and he decided to make two new rudders out of wood and carbon and bring them to Bermuda. It was a good thing he decided on two, when I arrived in Bermuda and inspected my remaining rudder, it had significant cracking along the top. Ultimately, it was fortunate that I had snapped one of my original rudders on the first leg. If we had managed to start the second leg with both of these all-carbon blades, I have no doubt they both would have fallen apart, and we'd probably still be out there, steering with my combination boothook/paddle through a plastic oarlock on the stern. So far, Fred's rudders were holding up beautifully.

Hoping we were getting near the northern wall of the stream, I started to watch the temperature reading on a regular basis - 84.2, 84.2, 84.2, 85.6, 85.6, 84.9. It bounced around for over an hour and then settled in at 86 degrees. I assumed we were at northern wall - typically, maximum temperature and consequently maximum current. The speed was down to about 4.5 knots, the compass was reading 350 but the course over the ground was 30, and the waves were very impressive. With any luck, we would be free of the stream's grasp in about two hours.

I looked ahead and noticed a thick, steady line of clouds, extending from west to east. 'Hmm, the end of the Gulfstream,' I thought. I surrendered the helm to Fred and went below, ready to fight it out with the off-watch one more time. I glanced over at the multi-line instruments on the inside bulkhead and noticed that in the last ten minutes, the temperature had dropped to 83; we were definitely on the downhill run of the northern wall. By the time I was back on deck in two hours, the boat speed would be up to 6.5 knots and the compass and COG would both be reading 350 degrees, a direct course for Newport, about 270 miles away. Part of me hoped we'd punch through the light air associated with the center of the low and get into a northeast flow that would let us lay a course directly for the finish. I knew there would be some tough sailing ahead, but little did I know it would be the most difficult sailing I had ever done on Acadia.


To be continued.

Clay
Team Acadia