And I thought Biscay was big! Over the last seven days, I’ve sailed 200metres… Yes, I’m still in La Coruna. Why? Well, when I say I’ve run out of money, I don’t lie. But firstly, thank you to Paul & Lisa, from the Swedish sailing vessel Eekaros, currently docked in Amsterdam. They’re going around the world, and currently saving for a larger boat. Their current one isn’t that much bigger than mine, and they’re totaling three persons onboard (including the kitten)! I was looked after like family while in Holland by these lovely sailors, and they’ve assisted me again with some funds to keep me eating until my first paycheck. Here is a picture of us, with me wearing the same jumper I’ve had on since I left Australia, in 2006!

Monnikendam, Holland

Yes, I know the fenders are down. The engine failed, I wasn’t suppsed to be sailing…

Thanks guys!

A few days after arriving here, by great coincidence, someone I previously worked for via the web emailed with a job. So, being in a fortunate position where work is achievable if I just have an Internet connection, I’m staying here for a month to refill the boat with beans & diesel. And make repairs… I don’t earn a lot (seriously, working in a bar pays better) but if it means I can keep sailing, then I’ll do anything.

I’ve been here for seven days now, and it’s been fantastic. I’ve met really nice liveaboards, had a chance to recover from my sleepless Biscay crossing, and La Coruna is an interestingly transient place. There are ships from Norway, America, and even Japan coming through, and all going places far away. You can tell the boats that have made it this far, are not the day cruisers normally encountered when out sailing. The boats here have crossed the Atlantic, are just about to, or are heading off to other distant places. This also means that a lot of people are arriving from Biscay, all with stories of fighting FORCE 10 CONDITIONS. I’m well aware Biscay is more than capable of throwing up such harrowing storms, but I must admit, I’ve been taking Force reports with a grain of salt, and automatically reducing them by 3 points. It’s a little bit like estimating wave heights at sea - If you think the swell is six metres, the true height is half. I’ve been guilty of it myself, but I blame horizon physics, a secret branch of a science I just invented.

It is also really exciting that I’ve been able to get a little work while in La Coruna, because this means that with about 75% probability (I’ve just calculated that on a large computer), I will actually be making my own Atlantic crossing by the end of the year, or, at the very beginning of the next. This is really amazing, because I never thought I would be able to achieve it so soon - Every port I’ve arrived in, I’ve told the locals that I can’t continue, and that I’ll have to ‘winter’. And every time, something crops up that allows me to just move a little bit further. Also, having done with Biscay, I can relax for a little bit without fearing the weather too much. Biscay was a massive hurdle for the logistics of the trip, however now I can almost day hop down to Lisbon, wait for another good forecast, and go direct to Madeira.

I will probably wait in Madeira, or nearby for another few weeks, possibly I can even work again to make further repairs, and hopefully arrive in the Caribbean with more than $14 and six overdrawn accounts. So far, repairs scheduled for La Coruna, involve replacing all the chain plates for the standing rigging, installing an electronic bilge pump, replacing the mainswitch (again) and generally tidying up.

Other than that, my stay here will mostly involve being cabin bound with my laptop, watching the pilot vessels come in and out of the marina.

nick.

After my disappointment at the thought of Biscay, and not knowing what to do, I moved on from L’Aber Wrac’h the next day to Camaret, to wait for a Biscay window. This annoying piece of water has to be crossed somehow, and after some encouragement and a day to think about my options, I decided I had to go.

With the assistance of the professional weather routers Commandersweather searching for a weather window, a time was identified for a possible cross today - But upon further analysis yesterday, the passage deemed too risky - Swell of 8ft+ and winds of 30kts. I was somewhat disappointed, as I was ready to go… I had spent the previous few days going over Constellation, refuelling, and buying provisions, only to still be sitting in the harbour - At least I have some nice food for the next week! I really wanted to pop up in Spain with this post, but there you have it, I’m under the control of a fickle weather beast.

Re-packing the entire boat

Thankfully I did a good check of the boat, as I found an inner stay (one of the wires holding the mast up) had pulled through a chain plate on the deck. The plate had rusted on the inside and snapped. With the helpful assistance of a new friend in the marina, the plate holes were re-drilled, and a new U-Bolt was bolted in with an oversized stainless back plate on the underside of the deck. Not only that, but said friends cooked me one of my first real meals in months - In fact, the day before my scheduled departure, I was spoilt with more home cooked food, having met a local British couple who live in Brittany. They drove me around to supermarkets so I didn’t have to walk everywhere, and then took me home for a cooked lunch! I began to think ‘two of the best meals in more months than I can remember in one day, with a big crossing the following - This is either reward for making the decision to cross, or the last supper!’.

So today, I think I’ll move on down the coast, and wait on a new window. The forecasters think there could be something coming up next week, so I’ll keep exploring the coastline and see how I go. If I slowly make my way down towards La Rochelle, and if no windows open up, I guess I can investigate the Canal Du Midi which will take me through to the Mediterranean - However I suspect parts of it will be closed over the next two months, which may make that option impassable. I’m basically completely out of money now too, so I’ll hang out for another week, see what the weather is doing, cross if I can, or keep moving to La Rochelle, where I may be forced to park Constellation and seek work ASAP. If I can get a desk and an internet connection somewhere, I may be able to generate some money and move Constellation later on.

Any cheap marinas with free high speed WIFI between Camaret and La Rochelle?

nick.

Gigantic thanks to Ash & Tana from Melbourne, for sending through additional funds in my time of great need. I have such generous friends helping me behind all this, it’s simply amazing!

I’ve been waiting here in Monnikendam for the past two weeks - I left England around the 6th of August, and have unexpectedly spent what must be the best part of a month in Holland. The town of Monnikendam is incredibly quaint. As you walk down the small streets, there are chickens in the bushes, cyclists peddling past, the smell of smoke from the eel houses, and beautiful 100 year old original sailing barges moored up alongside - I swear on my life, I saw a man with a bicycle, holding a chicken under one arm and wearing yellow wooden clogs. Holland is great.

Constellation is coming together in terms of preparedness. The self-draining cockpit issue which has been a downer on me since I bought the boat, has been more or less solved for the immediate future. The floor really needs to be raised to fix it properly, but I’ve made some arrangements as a secondary measure, and I think it will suffice. I’ve also finally fixed the mainsheet connection to the boom, which tore off because of a destructive Chinese jybe - I never did find the special sliders, but again, I swapped some things around, re-riveted a few bits, and presto, it’s back. The spreaders have also been giving me stress, by dropping down after load has been put on the rig. It turns out when the mast was put up, the spreaders were not angled upwards slightly and tensioned correctly, which meant pressure on the rig would eventually loosen the lee spreader.

My final dilemma is that of the stove situation, because again I’ve been forced into heating food with tea-light candles, after finding my British gas tanks cannot be re-filled in Europe. It’s going to set me back 100euros for a new tank and regulator, and I just can’t bring myself to do it. For all I know, Portugal will have yet another standard to conform to. Oh what I wouldn’t do for a multi-fuel liquid stove…

The windvane (think of a wind powered auto-pilot) from Windpilot arrived last Friday, and it is proving to be the nicest piece of equipment on the boat. The engineering and quality of it is beautiful, and it’s a shame Constellation has a transom mounted rudder, because it means the Windpilot (I’ve yet to give it a name) will need to be mounted off of a custom stainless bracket. I’ve spent a a lot of time designing and r trying desperately to remember back to high school art classes in perspective drawing to create something that made sense. I eventually scribbled together a napkin blueprint, which the workshop seemed to understand. For some strange reason, the engineers kept insisting on speaking Dutch back to me, even though it was clear I had no idea what they were saying. When pressed they’d revert to English, but it turned into an amusing conversation after this repeated for about half an hour. I can’t work out whether it was forced learning, or if they thought I was faking my lack of linguistic flair - Either way, the bracket will be finished on Friday lunchtime, and I hope I can get it mounted by nightfall.

Which means, I’ll be leaving this weekend. (Weather pending).

Ohhh boy.

nick.

After explaining to a friendly Englishman in Zeebrugge about the plan to move into the canals, he disappeared into his boat and came out with a stack of charts. He exclaimed ‘this should get you to Hamburg’ - I couldn’t believe such luck! Enormous thanks to the man in the Dufour 40, for parting with an expensive set of charts.

I helped Johannes into Rotterdam with all his equipment, and saw him off back to Hamburg. It was sad to see him go, but it had to be, and I was glad the trip could still continue, even if it meant meandering through the canals. I called my good friend Ben in Germany, who managed to create the time to come over and accompany me for a few days aboard to Rotterdam. It wasn’t without mishap, when I grounded Constellation because I was concentrating more on keeping nice wind on the sails, than staying within the channel markers on the Oosterschelde however… Enormous thanks to the two unknown Belgian sailors who came to our rescue, literally minutes after my poor helming. Ben suprisingly volunteered (or as skipper did I overexert my power and demand it? I can’t remember!) to jump in and retrieve the tow-line. With us leaning on the boom and ‘August’ the Yanmar engine in full reverse, a few tugs had us back on our way.

I spent another few days in Rotterdam, contemplating the idea of getting work. I was quickly influenced to continue further north when two friends flew over from England to join the trip. We motored out of Rotterdam and made good time to the outskirts of Amsterdam within a few days. While my charts are spectacular, it seems the one from Dordrecht to Amsterdam went AWOL, and navigation consisted of asking people which way to go, and referring to a road map of sorts.

Outside of Amsterdam we had to wait until 1am for a bridge to open and let us into the city, after which nine more bridges were opened in succession. It was surreal moving through the middle of the night with 15 or so other yachts, who were also following the ‘Standing Mast Route’ (the route which allows you to keep your mast up).

So here I am, in Amsterdam… I’ve run out of money, and am trying to find work… I desperately wish I could just keep sailing. I don’t know what I’m doing, I don’t know what’s going to happen in the future, and tomorrow I’m going to move out of the marina and live with the other boats taking advantage of free mooring along the inside of a canal in northern Amsterdam - I didn’t quite think my trip would end under such circumstances so soon, being moored up as a gypsy (literally) and becoming terrified of the oncoming winter, but there you go.

I fear the day counter at the top of this page is nothing more than a countdown to nothing at the moment… But I’ll keep trying - The Bay of Biscay can still be crossed within the next month, contrary to popular thinking, and with some kind of self-steering I don’t see why it couldn’t be done.

nick.

Thanks everybody for the kind comments in my launch post. I have answered one or two of the questions from the comments here.

Firstly however, not only was the launch a success, but post-launch jobs have also been coming along nicely. I went into Southampton to buy a battery charger at my new favourite store Argos, and attempted to charge up the batteries I have… But alas they wouldn’t charge, and I splurged on new set, now totaling 220 amp hours. I serviced the engine, replacing the impeller, changing the oil and and filters, and bled the fuel lines with fresh diesel. To my amazement, the engine started straight up, after one and a half years of storage - I couldn’t believe it. I knew the engine was in good shape, having been new in 1999, but I wasn’t quite expecting such an easy job of it.

I’ve taken Constellation for a spin up the Hamble, but only just a little up river as I’m a bit hesitant until I’m confident things are reliable. I’ve put the mainsail back on, and am now just waiting on a friend to help me tension and adjust the rigging. Unfortunately my VHF radio is defective, so I’m saving my pennies for a replacement. I’ve spent this weeks cash on batteries and a charger, so I have 15pound left for food until Wednesday, and next weeks budget is already spent on new running rigging.

I have a holiday set for the 2nd of July, until the 11th, where Constellation will hopefully have her inaugural voyage to France. I have my fingers crossed Paulo from Portugal can make it over to assist with the passage, however failing that, my next post will be one searching for an able crew member, who likes small boats and a good chance of a completely chaotic crossing.

As for the trip to Germany, Johannes and I will be leaving for either Hamburg or Kiel in August. Johannes is hesitant about me leaving for the Canaries too late in August from Hamburg, so if I can, I will try and push the Germany trip to late July. The only issue (as always) in all this is money - If I had an EPIRB and about 300pounds in cash, I’d fly Johannes over and we’d leave tomorrow… But alas, as this entire escapade has been predicated on financial issues, I don’t see them ceasing anytime soon, so patience is my only option. Please note my departure countdown has now hit double digits - At this rate, it seems I may be leaving with two cans of tuna fish, and hand steering all the way to Australia…

The original owners of Constellation, who put up with my six month payment scheme, have been especially generous once again, and parted with their Avon tender. I couldn’t believe my luck, as I had been scratching my head and researching options regarding tenders, because I’m quite sure I’ll be avoiding marina fees as often as possible, by taking advantage of visitor moorings and anchorages. She needs a patch or two, but overall, Avon seem to make incredibly good equipment - It gives me confidence in the fact that my canister liferaft (also by Avon) is 19 years old. Thank you once again to Simon and Caroline.

Constellation & the new tender RIB

All it ever does in England is rain.

nick.

Very special thanks to Stewart for helping cover launch costs; a true gentlemen! Thanks also to Mezzo Man and David, who also donated funds and both hail from the United States. Without their generous help, I couldn’t have launched yesterday, and I wouldn’t be writing today with the news that not only did Constellation launch after all these months, but she floats.

Thanks to Rob, Karin and Al from the boatyard who assisted enormously, whether by helping paint my topsides, to offering advice and tools, and even refuelling my gas canisters for free.

Thank you also to Jack from DNR-Production who flew over from Germany to film and assist. Jack is the first friend I’ve had come and see whether my boat actually exists after all these months, and it was really nice to see a familar face.

Thank you to Jeremy Rogers yachts for sending over a rudder pintle at the last minute, and letting me pay for it next week because none of my credit cards work. Finally, thank you to John and Kelly at Pantaenius for helping me get Constellation insured - The only people who would go beyond the pale in helping me obtain worldwide 3rd party insurance.

The evening before the launch I was still working on the boat, creeping around the hull with a Tesco’s desk lamp, finishing off the paint, and ensuring the skin fittings and new transom pintle were secure and water tight. I woke up early, and finally had a chance to see if all my rudder construction was succesful, and I must say, I was fairly proud of myself when it all came together. Thanks Dad for being a wood worker, even though I’m not, because I must have picked something up along the way. The paint was still wet on the cheeks when Constellation launched, and needs another coat, which I’ll need to paint on from a tender in the water. If you look carefully at the photos, you can see the waterline on the rudder still has pink panther pink on it.

Its been an enormous journey finally getting in the water, and now things are really set to start moving along. For almost 12months now, this entire project has been just a concept and a website, however now things have been pushed forward to a new level. The only thing that stops me from going for a sail right this second, is a new starter battery. And I must admit, that feeling is quite intense, because now that I carry my house on my shoulders, I have a new feeling of freedom quite unlike anything I’ve experienced before. I admittedly have some obstacles in my way, such as money issues, and the fact it would probably not be particuarly safe is I started off tomorrow, but it is the potential that is worth mentioning, and for that feeling to arise, a lot has been sacrificed to get here.

Thank you again to everybody; now the hard work really begins.

Two hours before launch, the rudder still wasn’t on.

“Jaaack… Tell me nothing will go wrong!”

Constellation being backed onto the crane sling platform.

I had to finish off some of the antifouling on the hull while in the sling, and as I was underneath, she slipped (note the rope between to the two slings) and I came very close to moving at the speed of light in utter fear of being crushed. Special thanks to the rope that stops the slings from dropping 3.5tons of boat.

‘Round she goes

Eeek!

The photo set now jumps straight to being moored, because as soon as she was in the water, I was onboard checking the seacocks furiously to see whether water was pooring in. Not a drop, the boat is completely watertight from the bottom (I still have window and cockpit leaks, but they’re above the waterline).

I had a small pontoon party.

Which ended at the Jolly Sailor.

nick.