Daily Report #64

Ahoy Kapers.

Vasco de Gama called it the Cape of Good Hope. Before that, another explorer had already called it the stormy cape. And that's it.
This morning we arrived in Struisbaai at about three o'clock after a fantastic race against the clock to arrive here around 01h00 because of the approaching westerly storm. Anchoring in the lee of higher shore was the assignment. The windlass stopped working. But that's okay. You can always spend anchor chain.
So at 4.30am we were anchored as advised by John and when I awoke from my subconscious thoughts at 8am we were scratching. And then you have to raise anchor. Then it's nice if you have a winch.
So I put on my overalls and went exploring in the always wet forecastle. Mark tying the knots and me diagnosing. After installing a new hydraulic valve and examining everything, it turned out that a plug of a solenoid valve was loose near the propulsion motor. It's the little things...
We then spent four hours keeping the anchor in the middle of lingering humpback whales. The winch is functioning properly. We are in a nature reserve. Haven't had time to read the brochures yet.. The wind was strong and there were some nice waves on higher shore. Anchoring finally succeeded. It had some feet in the earth. Fortunately we had a lot of anchor crab space on higher shore. In the meantime Mark has also replaced the broken coupling piece of the stay tensioner, so we are well on track again.
The list of jobs for Cape Town is getting longer because if you are going to use the stuff.. We had checked and marked the anchor chain in Darwin, but just beyond the 30 m we had done there was a link that was very thin. So spending more chain was not possible and we wanted to. We did some tinkering with harps and so on, but a meter further there was another one. So we have to pay attention to that when we are not anchoring. To fail in preparation is to prepare for failure. Fortunately, we are very capable of solving our problems debout
It's all part of it.
So this Cape round will go down in the books as one with little sleep and, above all, holding on.
Tomorrow afternoon we leave here to arrive in Cape Town 24 hours later. If everything goes well. The table mountain is probably on the program. Tablecloth and picnic basket.
We have seen waving seals, signaling whales, gannets, albatrosses and many petrels. Here too there is still a lot of life in and on the water. It is also quite busy here with seagoing cargo ships. Man, you can't get around it.
We had a fish soup for lunch, granulo with yogurt for breakfast and coffee with a chocolate in between. We don't know for tonight.
The list for Cape Town:

- Eliminate leaks at the front.
- Eliminate leakage from the water tank filler cap
- make 24 V running light.
- Replace anchor chain links.
- Make a protective cover for the plotter.
- Place two new main rigging tensioners.
- Play the tourist.
- Compromise liver function.



I am currently watching The Witcher series on Netflix. Superman with long white hair. Delicious. I also recommend Diplomat.