We’ve had a little adventure within the adventure since my last entry. About 200 miles from the coast of Mauritania, our starter motor caught fire! Like other boats, we had been using the engine to only charge the batteries and not for propulsion as it states in the race rules. A slight diversion to Cape Verde was needed as being unable to start the engine in the event of an emergency was too big a risk. We aimed to arrive in Mindelo on the island of St Vincent. This was reasonable as the marina has sufficient facilities due to it being a stopover point for the ARC+ race competitors. Getting into port proved to be quite the undertaking. 25 knots blowing down into the day coupled with no engine power meant that we had to carefully tack inbetween anchored yachts while waiting for a dinghy to tow us in. Due to the strong winds of course, we ended up needing 3 dinghies to get us on a pontoon safely.
What was supposed to be a simple part replacement turned into a treasure hunt for the elusive starter motor. A 4-day search in fact. All options were tried out. Flying one out from the UK, buying one from another boat and even asking around other islands. We lived day by day wondering if each one would be the departure point. The silver lining to our troubles was St Vincent itself. Great weather, clean and for me, being back in Africa. A new country and one that speaks Portuguese. I spent my time hiking, going to the beach and going out to restaurants. I didn’t complain about having a few days of relaxing on land, and I’m sure my sentiments were felt by other crew members. After 4 days, it was time to finally leave, as the local marina engineer had turned up outside the boat with a new starter motor in his hand. Where he got it from, we don’t know and didn’t really care. The engine started up again without a problem as we set off the next morning.
Back in the race! The past 2 days have been great wind wise, and we have been averaging 8.5 knots. The challenge has been the sea state. 3 metre waves coming from behind means that the person on the helm must continuously correct the boat to avoid crash gybing or broaching. This is easier said than done especially at night with an additional 25 knots of wind backing into the stern. Because of this, on-watch crew usually swap on the helm every 30 minutes. Another feature of Venturoso; no autopilot.