Official Jessica Watson Blog

Casting off the mooring lines bright and early

Bruce and I cast off the mooring lines and set off into rainsqualls and 20knts of wind on the nose for youngestround.com’s first big sail. To begin with we made good progress then the wind dropped right off under the rain clouds and while I ducked below to stay out of the rain we discovered that the trusty auto pilot had a few personally traits and christened him Mr Wonky. If I’d thought to re-write the user manual I’d have written; to sail in a straight line press go left, followed go right then press go left then go right and repeat till you reach your destination, oh and please enjoy!

So with a few accidental jibes (changes of direction) we slowly sailed south before discovering a problem two, water in the bilge! I quickly offered to take the wheel and Bruce gallantly set to work bailing the bilges, we were relived to find that the water was from washing the boat down the previous night and not some life-threatening leak.

At the top of Moreton Bay progress was slowed by a strong out going tide and our speed was reduced to a thrilling 3 knots with the assistance of the iron topsail (engine).
As we made our way down the passage a shackle on the main sail traveller suddenly snapped as the wind briefly gusted to a not very severe 25knots. We soon had the problem fixed to notice that the starboard lower (one of the wires that hold the mast up) had begun unravelling itself!

The last leg across the bay was a special one with the wind finally pushing us along perfectly and the sun setting before sailing into the river surrounded by the city lights.
We found our berth at Rivergate before heading off for nice warm showers and food.

Over all, I was very proud and impressed with the way the boat sailed even with a set of sails that can only be described as rags and rigging that was disintegrating in front of us. We learnt a lot about youngestround.com from the one day and I’m looking forward to stripping the boat for a complete refit so that everything can be rebuilt ready to take on the world.