He ended up soaking wet and tired – the only part of his clothing that was dry was a section in the middle of his shirt! Meantime lack of balance meant that I (Margaret) couldn’t be as useful as I wanted to be. The windvane we rely on to steer whenever we’re sailing was responding too slowly for the conditions. The gale was accompanied by driving rain, and in the worst of it Richard was hand steering. In the worst of it Richard tied in the third reef at the end of the boom so our mainsail became more like a loose footed storm sail, and carried no jib at all. We left on a strong wind forecast and ended up in a gale that night, with the seas breaking and sizzling around us and the boat sometimes surfing down waves at eight or nine knots (theoretically we shouldn’t be able to go faster than six-and-a-half). Particularly since later – again – we found ourselves caught in a situation where the forecast we left on was different from the weather we had to deal with. Richard went looking and found the lock nut for the large bolt that holds our mast in place sitting on the side deck! A good thing that happened when it did since we could see and fix the problem right away (we have a large selection of nuts and bolts, new and used, on board, and from time to time they come in very handy). The day went well enough, though at one point we were alarmed to hear the sound of something metallic bouncing on the deck. Not a huge problem since we expected to be in Gaspe the next morning, but we did have to use what was left carefully. That’s when the water in the tank ran dry, and we found ourselves with just one jug of water left. The next part of the trip was an overnight one straight to Gaspe, so though we rose early we had breakfast at anchor and cleaned up. Happily it didn’t make a sound, and we slept well. Not being sure what it was in or how well the anchor would hold we left the drag alarm on all night. Every now and then a larger wind ripple rocked the boat gently.
Then early in the evening a small wind set the anchor light to swinging and its rope to tapping, and the anchor chain ground and slapped restlessly. All was peaceful, and we watched the seabirds dive and call till dusk. There we anchored off a beach, hoping that the bottom was sand. Then we did the downwind rock, the boat moving gently from side to side as we sailed, toward Miramichi Bay. We went out past seabirds wheeling and diving in search of food and two tents set up among the dunes by the beach. We left Richibucto with the sunrise, putting up the mainsail in the harbour and heading out with the tide, hoping to ride it most of the day.
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