sailing

Four intrepid members of the ABYC recently sailed on a square rigger, The Lord Nelson.

In February Terry Phipps (86), Paul Martin, Morgan Griffiths and Arthur Rump signed on as crew on the 3 masted bark “the Lord Nelson” for the 10 day voyage from Cape Town to Durban. The Lord Nelson is a traditional square rigged sailing ship operated by the Jubilee Sailing Trust which aims to expose people of all ages and abilities including handicapped people to the joys of tall ship sailing. The ship had 15 permanent crew including trainees and a number of engineers who were trying to install air conditioning which they finally got going just before Durban. The 34 voyage crew divided into 4 watches. Of the voyage crew 8 were handicapped to a greater or lesser extent including 2 on wheelchairs. The ship has lifts to enable the wheelchairs to get around plus instructions in Braille for the visually impaired and vibrator pads for the deaf. Sleeping arrangements are somewhat primitive being bunks with lee boards (to stop you falling out!) although the severely handicapped do have special arrangements.

The watches are of 4 hours duration except for the 2 dog watches from 4pm to 6pm and 6pm to 8pm which effectively staggers the watches so that no one is permanently on watch at mid-night! The voyage crew take it in turns to do mess duty ie one person per watch for 24 hours. Although cooking facilities are cramped the food was excellent and plentiful in fact it was amazing what “cookie” was able to produce. One of the ABYC members actually managed to pick up 2.5kg on the voyage! No prizes for guessing who. The voyage crew also clean the ship in “happy hour” at 9am every morning.

When one is on watch the duties include look out (we proved that radar does not pick up a fibreglass yacht!), helming the ship and taking numerous log readings every hour. The watch also provides the muscle power to trim and set the sails when needed although “all hands” are required for major sail changes. Setting the sails can include climbing the ratlines to get up the mast and out onto the yards, although one does wear a safety harness this is certainly good fun while the boat is sailing and definitely requires a head for heights! Obviously handicapped people do what they can. The watch is supervised by a senior member of the permanent crew and the watch leader who is a member of the voyage crew.

The 4 sailors from the ABYC had a wonderful voyage sailing and the engine was only used less than 40% of the time, which is good considering that a square rigged ship is limited in its ability to go to windward. They experienced 2 force 9 gales, both of which started at night, one when approaching Port Elizabeth and one near Durban. A square rigger is designed to take strong winds although some of the voyage crew suffered! 3 ABYC members were all on the same watch and in fact were on watch when the first storm hit at about 4am. We then recorded the fastest ship speed of the voyage ie 11.5 knots and greatest distance in one watch ie 37nm.

Author: Arthur Rump