Farewell to All at St Helena - Zac

Friday was the big day. Pete and I had managed to pull the whole windvane off of the back of Intrepid, load it on to the ferry boat and bring it back to the radio station at Saint FM to make it easier to work on. I got the plastic bearings and a hard copy of the Monitor manual complete with diagrams all in one place from Natasza and went to work. I had been piecing together Facebook messages and parts of the manual without diagrams for the past few days. Having the manual was like having all the missing links. It is a bit of a tricky job trying to get 18 tiny bearings to stay in place. In the end I used liquid soap (no grease allowed) to hold them in place. I finally got it back together and carried the thing down the street back to the ferry. Josh and I wrestled it back into place with me in the water and Josh balancing off the back of the boat trying to get everything lined up right. We finally got it all together right as the sun was going down.

We went ashore for what I hoped would be my last night on the island and watched a movie at Ed's house with a bunch of my Saint friends. I said some good byes and went back to Josh and Pete's and crashed for the night. The next morning I got some last provisions, did a radio interview at Saint FM, and went down to the waterfront with Mike, Bernice, Josh and Pete. I will miss all of the English-type food that I have been eating since Papua New Guinea. Especially those pies with all kinds of tasty things in them. I can't remember what those pyramid-shaped things are (mom's note: Samosas) but I'll miss those too.

I said some hard good byes to another bunch of great friends. I had been staying with Mike and Bernice at Saint FM and it had become my second home. I had also become good friends with Josh and Pete and had stayed at their house for the past week so as not to wear out my welcome at the station. We had some great times.

After saying good bye to another group of friends I went out to the boat and did some final prep. To be prepared for a 4 week passage there is a lot to get on board. I spent awhile stowing food and water and lashing down fuel cans.

I dropped the mooring line and headed out into a nice 15 knots. I prayed that my vane would behave. I set the sails and the vane and sailed smoothly for about an hour until the wind dropped off to about 4 knots and ended up motoring to put some distance between me and the island. Having no electric autopilot I hand-steered for a couple of hours til I got just enough wind to move the boat along and got some sleep.

I was really tired and with all of the busyness forgot to call home. Unbeknownst to me I had everyone worried and trying to figure out what might have happened to me. Sorry mom!

I sailed through the night well and this morning the wind built up which has been great. It is good to be out again and making progress on the next leg. Right now the wind is a nice 18 knots off of the aft quarter. I hope it holds through the night. Gotta go do some sail trim before I go to sleep. I'll write again soon.

Cheers,

Zac


Note from Mom: I am working on getting an address for Grenada. Will let you know this week.