We are currently about 120 nM off the coast of India, north of The
Lakshadweep Islands and The Maldives, but the hardest part of the journey so
far has been simply leaving Dubai. We had six weeks preparation time from
our decision to go cruising to our original target departure date. This
date was subsequently brought forward by two weeks, so four weeks of
intensive preparation was quite a good effort by my account. I managed to
get all of the important stuff done, which involved calling on favours from
friends all around, including a team of Emirates pilots working around the
clock to carry an EPIRB, foul weather gear, and a replacement rudder bearing
to Dubai from distant corners of the globe.
The biggest challenge (and stress) was replacing a lower rudder bearing
which had become so tight that steering became an upper body workout. The
whole exercise took eight days, five of which were lost to hear "the bearing
will be here in two to three weeks". Well, that's not good enough- that
would have taken us into cyclone season! Those of you who have seen the
determined side of Helen won't be surprised that she contacted every Bavaria
dealer in the world (not a typo...), and finally tracked down the required
part in Sydney. Twenty four hours later it was on an EK flight on its way
to Dubai, and another twenty four hours later we had beautiful "as new"
steering. I won't dwell on the experience of scuba diving under Aroha in
the less-than-clean DOSC marina, but as yet we haven't succumbed to chorea
or E-coli or whatever other bugs call it their home. (some of which probably
haven't even been scientifically discovered yet).
After the last minute rudder repair, we had a day of last minute
provisioning and preparation, and set off only two days later than planned.
Alas, about six hours out we had a gear failure in the roller fuller on the
fore sail and we ended up with a torn foresail. At around the same time the
bumpy seas and 34 knots winds caused the auto pilot and wind instrument to
stop working. We limped back to DOSC, feeling rather sorry for ourselves.
To add insult to injury, I screwed up the parking, coming into our berth. I
would like to say that we were shaken but not stirred, but we were
thoroughly both shaken and stirred.
I would never have thought it possible, but all those challenges were
overcome, and we set off at about 2pm the following day for Fujairah. Talk
about a team effort- lots more favours owed to a growing list...
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