It’s “Ship Day” – the locals term for any day the RMS St Helena arrives.

Luckyfish is like a beautiful girlfriend, with some bad habits. The crossing to St Helena had been her maiden ocean voyage and it had exposed some issues.  You can’t love a girl who burps farts and whinges. These habits would have to be addressed and fixed at St Helena before we continue. Luckyfish had performed incredibly on the passages from Cape Town to St Helena. Safe, seaworthy, self-steered all the way, strong cross-winds at times but no sense of capsize risk, or broaching/pitch-poling. If only the Beam 4 slippage can be fixed and the noise from the gaffs, then she will be the Miss World of cruisers.

We will be remaining on the island much longer than planned. From a cruising perspective, if a place takes 8 days to get there then you should stay one month!. Plan to spend at least 3 times the voyage length, at your destination. Each one of us is assessing this lifestyle, in our own ways, to see if it is “for us”.

Rose at 8:00. Egg, marmite, bread and butter for breakfast. Waved farewell to Michael and crew on Crystal.

Warm, calm day, swam, cleaned hull and rust stains from gudgeons. Assessed practicality of installing retaining blocks on Beam 4 to prevent the sideslip when lashings work loose. Seems doable. Found 3 more cracks in fillet joints, two on the port and starboard gunwhale rubbing strips and one new area – the inside starboard bow chine. Inspected rudders, trim-tabs, lashings. All fine.

Next big challenge: Learning to chill. Still clinging to the old schedule, rush rush way of life and getting ready to move on.

However, found cracks in hull, my heart sank. Not only because it will mean a delay, but more because of that sickening feeling that comes when your confidence in the structure of your ship has been tarnished. But then learned from our Canadian neighbours Betty &  Luis on Ave del Mar (Spanish – Bird of the Sea), that the whale sharks are coming. Maybe we should wait for them to arrive. Yin and Yang.

Burned Tuya’s shirt today. Crazy Korean messaging with no understanding. Girls had a hair day after the boat cleaning. Did not go to shore today.

Went shopping, Zaya got a nice blue top, Stew some dark shorts, Tuya white top and had a special treat lunch at the Orange Tree Oriental Restaurant. Met Daisy and brother Joff – the Filipino proprietors. Delicious Thai curry and Chinese meals, washed down with a bottle of Stellenbosch Chardonnay, £80-. 

Tried wifi at Ann’s Place, hopeless. Phoned Mum using £10- phonecard. Found shops quite well stocked. Johnny Walker Red Label 700ml £25  ouch!. Jamestown local Gin 750ml £9.95 big tick!

Chilled on the boat in the evening, watched the Squid and the Whale, brilliant movie. Had dolphins chilling by the boat at night. Big fish hanging under the hulls. Met Michael, the Polish round-the-world “charter” guy with 7 on board “Crystal”. He chatted to us and told us he could only fund to go RTW was to sell spots on the boat for the various legs. He had a facebook page and attracted clients from Poland. The price he paid was that he had a lot people’s diverse needs to manage.

Lazy morning. Broke out the new camping shower complete with 12V submersible pump and shower head. Everyone loved it. Had a swim off the boat, scrubbed the Walvis Bay scum line from inside the port hull. Will do one side per day for 4 days. Shortened halyards, ramp uphaul.

Arrived off Jamestown: 0700

Began seeing row of high red lights as we approached. 6am dawn saw the impressive high barren island ahead and to port on arrival at the first waypoint. 3 miles later and we had rounded the NE point and arrived at James Bay.

St Helena radio advised port control would open at 0830. We picked up mooring #18 and friendly Canadian yacht Ave del Mar advised that previous catamaran on this mooring used a stern line to their mooring buoy. Luckyfish would not lie head to wind due to the strong current, so with help from the ferry boat we put out stern line and had an idyllic secure anchorage, shared with 6 or 7 other yachts.

Luckyfish debuts in the cruising community at last!

Port Control advised come ashore via ferry boat and do formalities at white building with clock tower atop. Met Steve the Harbourmaster. £40 harbour dues, £2 mooring per day, Customs no charges, Immigration £17.50 arrival fee, ferry boat £2 per person per round trip. All very reasonable including medical insurance from Solomon’s in Main Street. £1 per day per person.

The walk along wharf area to Harbourmaster office very quaint. Row of stone buildings set into cliff face akin to Cornish harbour scenes. Nothing prepares you for St Helena. Whether it was regaining land legs, lack of sleep or the thrill of arrival, everything seemed dreamlike in the main street. Tuya said it looked like a toy town. To me, it seemed straight out of a quirky BBC serial set in a strange coastal fishing village.

Discovered 1502 by Portuguese who found Ascension Island in 1501. 80% of all Britain’s marine species live here. RMS St Helena supposed to end service Sept 2016. Airport planned to open May 1, 2016 (Foundation Day). Had the first flight Sept 2015. Found a problem with airport calibration and had a second flight 2 weeks ago. Now going through accreditation procedure. Last British territory only accessible by ship.

Funny phrases “Before time and After time”. No-one seems to know before or after what historical event. Local people call New Years Eve, “Old Years Last Day”. Locals are called “Saints” or “Sainter’s”. Saints are descended from a mixture of freed slaves from Madagascar and Africa, Brazilians, British, Chinese free settlers. \

Met the resident British ex-pat radiographer at the New Years street party and her diver husband. A friend of theirs identified the whale or whales that greeted us, right there on the spot, from our video on the Galaxy S6. Pilot Whales.

St Helena just got the mobile phone on 3 months ago, cars have 4 digit number plates, phone numbers have 5.

Distance to run: 84nm

2 hour watches all night. Clear starry sky, moon rise at 0030. 84nm to go at noon (1000 UTC). Sunrise at 0600 UTC (St Helena time).

Probably start slowing boat to 3 knots at midnight to arrive James Bay at dawn. i.e. can trawl trolling lines today (not worried about drag, which isn’t much anyway I guess) so started fishing again.

Whales pay us a visit.

Kite only collapsed twice, was able to roll over and tighten the sheet from my cockpit bunk.

2 hour watches, most enjoyable. Knotted stomach, doubts and anxiety of first few days gone. Replaced by desire to keep doing this.

Sailed all day under kite then dropped kite at 2200 – girls assisting with controlling the sheets and braces, unfurled the jib and controlled speed all night, rolling jib in and out according to wind strength. 10 -15kts to keep speed at 3 to 4 kts, just enough so we didn’t have to hand steer :-). Sighted St Helena at dusk as darker outline back-dropped by grey smudge of cloud on horizon.

Distance to run: 222nm

Light winds overnight under full sail. Gybed @ 1030. Noon to noon run 113nm. 222nm to go. Touch and go for arrival St Helena before noon on 31 December.

Homemade Khushuur for lunch. Selfies in the cockpit and decks. Lovely sailing.

Options, gybe downwind on 290˚ and 340˚ headings, or dead flat off under “Twin spinnakers” (foresail and staysail) or Kite.

Got back to layline at 1530 with 200nm to go. Chose to drop main, staysail, hoist kite, drop foresail, gybe boat and then hoist main on new gybe heading 310˚ on rhumb line for St Helena.

Wind backed 20˚ at 1730, shadowing kite so dropped main and ran all night under kite. (first time I considered doing this and found it to be quite safe and possible).

Perfect conditions, 10-15knots. Frantic search for paper chart of St Helena Island. Then I recalled Tony Herrick’s email saying he could not provide. Would use OpenCPN to navigate around island (as I had overlooked buying a chart module for the chartplotter!).

Distance to run: 335nm

Noon, end of the 5th day since clearing Pelican Point. 335 miles to go. Average daily run since leaving Pelican Point is 169.1nm, for 5 days. Just over 7 knots average speed.

Had a fast and smooth night sail. Wind veers to South during the night and backs 30˚ to East during the day. Have not laid a hand on Juliet (vane-steering) for 2 days. Steering 290˚ during day, 320˚ by night. Average course 305˚.

Full sail all day (staysail, foresail, mainsail) in 15knots, speed is 6 to 8 knots. Found a squid on the deck in morning.

Put out 2 lures. 3 x hair washes and a shave. Cooked pasta again. No fish.

Changed the water maker filters due to rotten egg gas (from Walvis Bay sewerage). Lesson, don’t commission your watermaker in shitty water.

Tried eye splicing the bridle eyes without success. Rope weave is too tight.

Zaya and Stewart have thoughts about the perfect Wharram. All living upstairs in pod(s). Cooking, sleeping, eating, sitting, steering etc. Hulls just for storage, stores, toys. Should be no need to go below on passage. Communal pod living. Electrics, breakers and gauges all on top too. We like living in our bubble on top of this raft as she flies along.

Tuya now doing her night watches on her own. 2 hours on, 4 hours off. Works great, everyone getting plenty of rest. Occasional ships.

Approx 850nm WNW of Walvis Bay.

Shook out 2 reefs in foresail mid morning in perfect sailing conditions.

Fiddled with chartplotter and manual, still learning. Got bearing to waypoint (BTW) and DTW, waypoints and routes going! That should make keeping track of distance run etc too simple.

Received message from Glen on Satphone – very nice. Noticed salt deposit build up on lashings from repeated soaking, stretch, squeeze, evaporate. Repeat.

Starting wearing Zaya’s harem pants to air out nut rust. Lovely day. Girls venturing out, taking selfies on the forward decks.

Stew cooked lovely pasta. Shook reef out of main at dusk. Lovely night ride in the “bubble” all zipped up, on flatish seas under full sails. Averaged 7 to 8 knots all night.

Zaya found a ship on radar, no AIS, just a bounce. Occasional surfs at 10-12knots but normally quiet. Exhilarating sailing.

Distance to run: 662.9nm

Began with Happy Birthday boiled eggs. Birthday girl later cooked dinner of boiled potatoes and carrots, and threw up. All 3 sat down and then devoured the birthday dinner.

No presents. All postponed as Walvis Bay didn’t sell any nice jewelry, despite trying every store.

Perfect sailing conditions all day. Continued under staysail to mid morning to keep things nice and comfortable on board, 1000 up went foresail with 3 reefs. 1500 shook out 3rd reef to keep speed above 6 knots.

Tuya feeling better so able to step on it in a lightening breeze. Toshiba blue screened and died. No gribs as X-gate not registered on the Samsung laptop. Installed GPS driver and got fixes on OpenCPN. Put waypoints into plotter. New source of entertainment watching the distance to waypoint (DTW) run down. 662.9nm @ 1915 Walvis Bay time (1715 UTC).

All tummies getting better. Bread, Berocca, oranges, boiled eggs is main diet, with marshmallows and peanuts for snacks.

Only just managing 6 knots so hoisted 1 reef mainsail to speed up and help Juliet who is struggling to cope with lee helm. Speeds now 6 to 12 knots (occasional surfs), averaging 8. Need to ave. 6.25 knots to make Jamestown by noon on 31 December.

Zaya reading 2 Girls, 2 Catamarans. Says she is having a great birthday.