Passage to Richards Bay (South Africa)

[Kyle]Our departure from Ilot Pouhou in Mayotte was an easy, low-key affair. Instead of leaving right at first light, we stayed in bed until we were both sure we were slept out. Then we had a big, leisurely breakfast, tidied everything up, and then released the mooring pendant.

the wind had just a bit too much east in it to be ideal, but by the time we made it to Bandrele Pass, it had backed to the north enough to allow us to sail out of the lagoon without having to tack. Once we were outside, we turned south to enjoy easy, downwind sailing in waters that had been flattened in the lee of Mayotte.

Passage Sailing - Started with a very calm exit through the pass at Mayotte

Our main spinnaker had snagged on something sharp the last time we furled it, so one of the panels would need to be replaced (and the sharp bit removed) before we used it again. We were flying our backup second-hand spinnaker when a slight gust peeled it away from the hems on either side. Bummer. We were doing so well! To be fair, that thing was on borrowed time when we got it, but the price was right.

Without it, we slowed a couple of knots, but it wasn’t long before the wind picked up and the jib had us back to our former speeds. Instead of sailing a direct course, we were heading WSW toward the Mozambique coast, chasing a favorable current. This put us on a point of sail that allowed us to carry full main and jib.

By day four, we were about forty miles off of Mozambique at the narrowest part of the Mozambique Channel between mainland Africa and Madagascar. With the current sweeping us through, we were able to put eighty miles behind us in the seven hours between noon and dark.

That fun was not to last. Each new forecast we got was indicating that an eighteen-hour period of moderate headwinds we had been expecting when leaving Mayotte was shaping up to be something a little more serious. This was even more so because it was looking like the worst wind would arrive just as we were in the strongest part of the current going right into it. After a few more days, Des, the weather guy who sent us daily updates, started hinting that we should be thinking of diverting to various safe anchorages along the Mozambique coast.

We weren’t having any of that. Firstly, it’s technically illegal, since it involves anchoring without clearing into the country. This is done all the time and seems to be easy to overcome with an extortionate bribe to any visiting patrol boats, usually in the form of a ‘fine’ for violating some non-existent rule about courtesy flag size or some other such rubbish {Maryanne: There does seem to be an acceptable practice for boaters to anchor and even go ashore at some of the sheltered anchorages, but thankfully we didn't need it}. My main objection was that each safe harbor option involves timing the tides to cross a narrow bar, going a long way in from sea, and then a long way back out again. What we decided to do instead was to sail out of the current in the direction from land and heave-to there where the waves would be less dangerous.

We beat the weather to our no-current spot by about half a day. We were doing so well and it was such a lovely day that it was tough to resist the urge to try to keep going and put another fifty or a hundred miles behind us before it was time to stop. That would, of course, have been exactly the wrong thing to do as it would put us in the very current we wanted to avoid. Thirty-five-knot winds against a four-knot current can produce survival conditions, whereas in no current, the same winds may just end up being uncomfortable, sloppy seas. So… on a beautiful day for sailing, we double-reefed the main, rolled up the jib, lashed the helm, and waited for the blow to arrive.

It wasn’t bad at all. Every six hours or so, a particularly big wave would hit us, causing a quick roll, but most of the time Begonia just floated up and over the crests. We could have sailed through it just fine, and by over-reefing and taking it a little slowly, the ride wouldn’t have been too uncomfortable either. Again, we had to remind ourselves that, while heaving-to had been unnecessary right where we were, the extra day it cost us at sea had probably saved us from a real beating further south.

Once it was clear the worst of the wind had passed, I waited out the rest of my night watch. Once Maryanne was up, I could feel free to make all of the noise I needed stomping around on deck and cranking winches to set sail.

As we re-entered the southbound current in the quickly abating wind, the left-over seas were indeed a huge mess of confused waves crashing into each other as they expended their energy. It was another thirty-two hours before both sails were unfurled to their full size as we continued to decelerate across a long, slow swell. We had now left the tropics.

We had a few different hitchhikers on this passage (the bird didn't want a photo taken, the dragonflies were quite common, although we've not seen them on other passages)

More unwelcome news arrived. The twenty-knot tailwinds that were supposed to take us the rest of the way into Richards Bay were now forecast to be an average of twenty, which in this case meant half of it was going to be five knots and the other half thirty-five knots. Great! Not only that, but there was a deepening low chugging up the coast that was shaping up to be way worse than the last one. We were now in a race to beat it to Richards Bay. We no longer had the luxury of waiting out light winds. We had to keep moving. Don’t spare the horses! When we left Mayotte, I had really been hoping we could make it all the way to the breakwater at Richards Bay before starting an engine, but it was not to be. We now needed to do a watch each with it droning away in the background. It was a relief when the wind picked up again and we could finally shut it down.

That relief was short-lived. We were soon reefing and then reefing some more. Even though we had wind with the current this time, the building waves were regularly slewing Begonia’s stern around into a skid. With lots of rudder input, she would straighten out, but not before a few uncomfortable seconds of side load would dump normally stable objects from their homes on tables and shelves onto the floor.

We arrived at Richards Bay at midnight, right the end of Maryanne’s night watch. She had spent the last two-thirds of it watching a wall of increasingly dense lightning approach from the south. As I was kitting-up to join her the wind died completely, the sails backed and we coasted to a stop. Time to get ‘em stowed and start the engine again. Actually, let’s start both to keep ahead of that approaching storm.

After a few sharp turns through the maze of channels between the first breakwater and the quarantine wharf, both the air and water were so calm inside that all we had to do was take the boat out of gear a couple of boat lengths away and coast to a gentle stop along the wall. We even had help from a couple of other boaters who were still up having a late night when they saw us come around the corner. We had just managed the last of our outdoor jobs securing Begonia when the skies opened and the whole harbor suddenly vanished in the deluge. What timing! There was just enough darkness for a long nap before Immigration arrives.