The Cosmos Adventure - News

Report From George Hotz -- Received August 20, 2002

Cosmos

Cocos-Keeling to Rodriques:

7/19/02:

I haven't made an entry in this journal since we started this trip due to the motion of the boat. I don't think that my geriatric hand/eye coordination is good enough to have hit the right keys until today. Things have calmed down a bit so I'll see if I can navigate this keyboard.

We expect to enter Port Mathurin, on the island of Rodriquez, tomorrow afternoon. We will have covered 2000 miles in about eleven and a half days. The 1st days were fast sailing; a tumultuous 7-10 knots, with 20-30 knot winds on the port quarter. It was cloudy and damp with a lot of boat motion. Finally, after about a week, we had a couple of sunny days during one of which we flew the cruising spinnaker. Then back to cloudy, wet weather with wind and rollers on the port quarter. We took a pretty solid hit from a rogue wave at 0350 on the morning of the 17th. It hit us square on the port topsides and everything that wasn't tied down went flying as well as a few crew mates. It also broke the big mirror in the starboard head; we're not worried about that; there is hardly ever anything in there worth looking at, anyway. Now, yesterday and today, we have a little sun mixed in with everything else. But we have made great time and look forward to seeing Rodriquez.

When we left Cocos-Keeling, Steve brought some coconuts along and, last week, he opened one up and Hilary grated the coconut meat. Then Anders made a coconut cake for the celebration of Captain Joe's birthday.  Later, Steve made macaroons with the left over coconut meat. Anders has been making bread a lot and is getting quiet good at it. If we don't always enjoy the weather or the boat motion, we always seem to enjoy the galley menu.

Some of the chores that we had to tend to enroute were to reattach the tow line to the water generator impeller due to chafe; replace a wire connector on the port engine alternator that corroded apart; and yesterday, I had to replace the impeller for the starboard engine cooling water pump.

We have established a radio network with another boat that is making the same trip as we are. We call each other up at noon every day to check up on each other and compare conditions and mileage, and just gab and tell a "joke of the day". A couple of days ago, we played a song to the other boat over the radio. The song is made up of new Cosmos lyrics sung to the tune of John Denver's "Country Road".

7/23/02:

We arrived at Port Mathurin, Rodriquez, on Saturday, the 20th of July; rainy day. This is a very nice island, but it does not appear, to me, to be very interested in attracting tourists, and there is no boat facilities or services at all. I had the opportunity to service the engines and the rigging and the rest of the crew got some chores done too. It was good to get off the boat and explore the island as well. We caught an enormous tuna on the way into port and we fed it to all of the other cruisers, and the some other guests, at a large gathering on Cosmos on Sunday evening. It turned out to be quite a social event with BBQ'd tuna, salad, and some other dishes, booze, guitar pickin' sing-a-longs, and a lot of chatter.

We had planned to leave today, but the Coast Guard warned us of a storm that was brewing and so we had a holiday. Perhaps we will leave tomorrow for Mauritius.

7/28/02:

We left Rodriquez on the 24th and had a nice sail to Mauritius with the exception of one evening's squall that caught us with too much sail up. The approach to Port Louis, Mauritius, was beautiful as we cut through some islands off the North coast. This gave us the advantage of sailing in with the tidal flood -- just in time for Happy Hour. Entering Port Louis harbor was very similar in appearance to entering Baltimore harbor. We tied up to the quay right in the middle of town and felt as if we were the center of attention. The next morning, the 27th, we moved Cosmos across the harbor to the marina; then the crew hit the town for our one day of shore leave. I took the time to flush the watermaker and change it's filter elements. Port Louis is a large town with lots of great shopping, good dining, and beautiful women. We left there this morning and will sail overnight to the island of Reunion.

We spent four days in Reunion getting Cosmos ready for the final passage to Durban, South Africa, and doing some sight seeing of this beautiful Island. Getting Cosmos ready for this critical passage meant checking the engines, rigging, sails, proper storage of everything in all lockers, preparing for emergencies. We reviewed all safety procedures, locations of all through hull fittings, radio frequencies for weather reports.

During this passage to Durban we will be vulnerable to the currents, winds, and severe sea conditions that occur in this part of the Indian Ocean. Good weather reports are invaluable and we are in radio and satellite phone contact with Durban Weather, Point Yacht Club in Durban, and Captain Joe's brother, Tom, and the Internet.

The sightseeing in Reunion consisted of renting a car and driving up to, and around, the volcano area of the Island. We spent the day in, and above, the clouds. We all took lots of pictures and will send some to our Webmaster for the Website.

8/9/02:

Cosmos left Reunion the afternoon of the 1st of August. We were all nervous and tense about the passage, but the weather looked good, the boat was ready. The weather stayed so good that we got in a couple of days of spinnaker sailing as we approached Madagascar. This helped us to keep our speed up; we wanted to get to Durban before the next series of gales started to aggravate the Mozambique and Agulas currents, along with any other foul weather.

The water that we filled Cosmos' water tanks with, at Reunion, was foul, and made some of us feel ill. We used this water up by taking showers and washing dishes, then refilled our tanks with water from the watermaker. The refrigeration system cooling water pump died about five days ago and I was able to adapt another pump to handle the task. I discovered during disassembly of the old pump that one of the brushes in the drive motor had become stuck in its channel. The motor would run, but didn't have enough power to pump water. I only had to clean up the brush assemblies and the rest of the motor, and reassemble it. I'll reinstall it when we get to Durban.

Anders has been making bread and pizza, and Hilary has made some carrot cake. The weather has been so good that we slowed down Cosmos enough to go swimming one afternoon. The good food and recreation has helped to ease the tension. A couple of days ago we got news of a new series of gales working their way around the Cape of Good Hope, and heading our way, so, we started motor sailing to keep our speed up. Cosmos has been going like mad and will reach Durban late tomorrow, Saturday, night. We received, and confirmed, weather reports today stating that this foul weather will not reach our area until late Sunday or early Monday. Are we lucky, or what?

8/10/02

It is 1200, we have 90 miles to go, it is clear and sunny, Cosmos is in the Agulhas current, the wind is on the starboard quarter, and we are sailing at 8 knots under full main and genoa. So, this afternoon, as Cosmos raced on, we lunched in the sun drenched cockpit, feeling smug and relieved that we may arrive, safe and dry, in Durban, South Africa, to end the second leg of our circumnavigation of this earth.                                

George