Is this the source of all my overheating problems with the engine? Actually I don't think so but it sure looks knackered doesn't it. Well here I am in an unexpected anchorage with I hope is a water cooled diesel engine but let me back up a bit. My tale of woe started with the passage from Las Palmas to Gomera. On the run in I overheated. Not a big problem. Faffed about a bit tacking to and fro but I made it into the most spectacular anchorage I had been in to date, under power and with daylight. Open to the South and South West, in other words the Atlantic, this idyllic little spot could turn into a nightmare at a drop of a hat, or a wrench for that matter.
I, true to form took a smattering of what was on offer in the local town because my mind was else where. That pernickety Mr. Lister Blackstone. Any old how to make a long story short, I bugged out on the 17th to escape the incoming 20 knot SW. The anchorage was already mega uncomfortable for the likes of my delicate self. One sleepless night followed by a sleepless night passage was a better option than staying in Val Gran Rey. Even if the cliffs were pretty. Well the saga turns to frustration when said weather system produces only a half hearted blow from the south and I spent 6 1/2 hours of my life drifting around Punta Abona, Tenereffe. Once I made the decision to sail in to anchor it took me 3 hours at a blistering 1 knot an hour. My comment in the log for 08:42 sums it up, "This sucks". I had experienced on average 18 knot winds up until 3 in the morning. I'd even been blown over by 40kn gusts in the wind acceleration zone between Gomera and Tenereffe, putting to the test a wind acceleration zone can work in reverse. The prevailing winds are from the north. I was trying to surf a southerly up to Santa Cruz, Tenereffe, where I could work on what was increasingly becoming my embarrassing engine. Poor old Mr. Lister Blackstone.
Well I am ok. Sitting here at anchor, having had a nap and a bit of a butchers at the old impellor, seems it is knackered too, I won't have to sail off my anchor tomorrow morning! A little frustrated yes. All these problems add up to more delays, but that said it is always good for me to be on passage. Click on the above photo for a few snaps. Hmmm dinner. . . Oh ya, you must ask me some time about the swimmers I rescued from the beach; never a dull moment, on the good ship Compromise.