"Spin-a-thong" - the business case for single-use spinnakers

Log extract.
Date: 20-Nov-2023
Position: Between Cape Verde and Grenada, we're sailing as part of the ARC+ fleet

Prelude:
The ARC+ fleet is in Mindelo, Cape Verde, and most boats have their laundry done by one of the local ladies. Unfortunately, they were a bit overwhelmed and quite a bit of laundry got mixed up between different bags. So, while in Mindelo, there was a vivid exchange on our Whatsapp group, between the different boats, with crew posting pictures of different clothing, asking "Got this returned in my laundry bag, it is not mine. Whose is it?"
Equally, there was an equally vivid exchange of people looking for "lost laundry"

Short extract from the ARC+ chat group on Whatsapp while in Mindelo, Cape Verde.

John: Another pair of shorts found in our laundry bag. (picture inserted). Is not ours. Who does it belong to?
David: Not mine. I lost red shorts, though.
Laura: In my returned laundry bag, I miss a set of black lace ladies' underwear.
Peter (me): I will give it back to you in Grenada.

Now back to our topic.

I hate spinnakers.
Those light sail power chutes are an endless source of problems on sailing yachts.

Several ARC+ boats had issues with their spinnakers already on leg 1 to Mindelo.

A friend had their spin wrapping around their genoa, making both unusable for most of leg 1.

When I saw the shreads of David’s spin, at the dock in Mindelo, I sat on the bow of our boat, crying...

But then I had a bright idea: “single use spinnakers”!

Biodegradable spinnakers which you hoist and never lower: you just cut halyard, sheets and tack line, and let go.

We can make it a sustainable business by using recycled materials.
Like using ladies' lace underwear. I am happy to offer my vast collection of ladies' lace underwear for trials of single-use spinnakers.
Through the years I collected loads of red, black, pink ladies underwear. This would make it a nice recognizable brand mark for our spinnakers: many different small patches of a wide variety of colours. And smells. Some would be very very VERY small patches, indeed. In Mindelo, I bribed the local ladies doing the ships' laundry, to give me the nicest lace ones. - Sorry Laura! - So, I am prepared for this business case, and pitch in!...

Is lace biodegradable? I know it needs to be washed at 30°. But is lace biodegradable?

What would be a good brand name for single use spinnakers, made from recycled ladies' lace underwear?

“One night with you”?
“Yes, but once only! “?
“Spinning thongs”?
“The Thong Thing”
“Thongs are in the air, everywhere I look around”?
“Give thongs a chance”?
“Thongs Go Kiting”?

I think I need to cut down on coffee. :slight_smile:

(signed) Peter Pan.

UPDATE: the name and byline suggested by Audrey:
“Spin-a-thong - "Disposable spinnakers which can get you through every crack in the wind"

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The "Adopt-my-dad" initiative, during the 2023 ARC+

Passage log excerpt
Date: 27-Nov-2023
Position: Somewhere between Cape Verde and Grenada

Aboard S/V Sturdeee (yep, that is with three "e"s but skipper Ian finds it funny to spell out the vessel's name, ending in "Echo, Echo, Echo,...."), a Lagoon 450F catamaran.
On board: formidable skipper Ian, equally formidable p(r)etty officer Dee (Ian's partner), crew mate Michelle, my oldest daughter Lana and myself.
We're sailing a trans-atlantic with the ARC+ flotilla of 100 other boats. Most boats have Starlink, so the flotilla's Whatsapp group is very active, and fun. This is an extract of one of the chat exchanges

Protagonists in this chat: Apart from Lana and myself: Audrey, Nick and Mark who are sailing on other boats in our ARC+ fleet. Actually, Mark was also the skipper I did my very first transatlantic with, back in 2005. Audrey is one of the most hilarious people I ever met, possibly more nuts than me. Moaied is, well, you'll have to figure that one out yourself.

Extract from the ARC+ Whatsapp group chat while under way:

Peter: Lana, honey, can you please tell me where you put the coffee?
Audrey is typing….
Moaied is typing…
Peter: Lana, I promise to let you out of the front sail locker if you'd just tell me where you’ve been hiding the coffee?
Audrey: ARC+ most patient daughter award goes to Lana.
Peter: Audrey,... WOMAN! I thought you were on my side?!?
Moaied is typing…
Audrey: Maybe Sturdeeeeeee should trawl Peter’s witty jokes to catch their fish
Peter: Audrey, relaying message from Lana: “Audrey, I already told you several times: DO NOT ENCOURAGE HIM… If he really lets go of his limited self-inhibitions and social self-restrictions and subconscious suppressions, he will be his usual nuts, and nobody wants that, right?”
Peter: PS: actual fact: Lana holds a bachelor and a masters in psychology… I am not kidding you. But here I am kidding: That is why I am only allowed in a social environment when she is around so she can properly warn and safeguard the others.
Moaied is typing…
Audrey: Like I said, most patient daughter award.
Lana: Thanks for the recognition! This is definitely the biggest challenge in patience that life has thrown at me. One tip: never let your dad convince you to go on a boat trip for more than 1 day.
Moaied is typing…
Mark: I can save a dried flying fish for you Peter if you want to smoke it with your instant soup mushrooms. Did Lana really know what she was taking on ?
Peter: Mark, at this point, lacking coffee, I am open for experimenting with any stimulant. Cup-a-soup mushroom flavour is now finished. Cup-a-soup onion flavour seems slightly milder.
Audrey is typing….
Mark is typing….
Lana is typing…
Moaied is typing…
Mark: Lana, perhaps pack some Valium next time. You could always take it yourself if it doesn’t work on dad.
Lana: We’ve been slowly going through my secret drug stash, but nothing seems to work… Anyone up for adopting a crazy sailor? My dad is ready for pickup in the middle of the Atlantic...
Mark: I have adopted him before. It’s someone else’s turn now!
Nick: I bid 20 goats
Peter: I found the coffee.
Lana: Oh, no. Here we go...
Moaied is typing…

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Sucking or blowing, that's the question.

This post is all about clouds. And winds that go with them...

I think for us, sea-faring people, the difference between "sailors" and "Sailors" (similarly to the difference between "men and boys", "girls and women", "chickens and eagles", "Bambi and Rambo") is (partly) made by "how well we can read the clouds".

Why is "reading" clouds important?

After 50,000 Nmiles of open ocean passages, I have experienced first hand how sailors look at weather apps, read something like "sustained NE-lies of 20 knots, gusts up to 25 knots for the next 24 hours", and interpret this as if it was the Holy Truth. And yet, at 2 AM, in the pitch dark, we get hit by an hour of gusts up to 40 knots and 90° wind shifts, having us struggling to reef our sails.

Likewise, when sailing in-between islands, all too many times, we rounded a corner or headland, and the wind changed from 12 knots to 35 knots, with an almost 180° shift, with the crew scrambling from bikini-sailing to survival mode with sails flapping in all directions. And that, while the weather prediction called for a 12-15 knots stable wind...

With weather apps like Predictwind or Windy (that is "windy.com", which rocks and not "windy.app", which sucks), getting better and better, in my opinion, we have become too reliant to sail solely on these apps to predict our wind and weather.

We forget that these apps are mostly based on larger scale atmospheric predictions - the dynamic between low and high pressure systems mostly (I am over-simplifying bit here).

But we forget that these apps are not that good at predicting precise local weather conditions, conditions defined by e.g. local topography or clouds. Many of us have experienced weird wind shifts caused by funnelling or katabatic winds when sailing close to coastal mountain ranges or in between islands. And likewise, any experienced sailor knows how clouds can cause similar wind changes as we approach them. Weather apps, in my experience, can make a "guess"-timate of those local conditions, but can not predict them precisely. At all.

This is no blame on those prediction apps, as these local conditions can be ..eh.. very "local": When sailing between islands, a minimum wind direction change can alter the funnelling effect between islands significantly. Likewise, a cloud, based on its density and saturation, at the moment it passes us, can make a very significant difference in wind direction and strength.

On this post, we'll forget about coastal sailing, islands and mountains, but we'll concentrate on "reading the clouds" while sailing offshore.

There are two types of clouds

There are "blowing clouds" and "sucking clouds" (and that is my own terminology). "Blowing clouds" are spilling energy outwards, and "sucking clouds" absorb energy inwards. End of paragraph.

Blowing clouds

"Blowing clouds", are mature clouds. They have accumulated enough energy to become saturated, and they will be spilling out that energy. That "spilling energy" will be in the form rain and wind.

You can recognize a "blowing" or "mature" cloud, by looking at its shape and colour, and looking what is happening under that cloud.
A blowing cloud towers high above the horizon. In its more extreme form, they form a "T"-shape.
Typically they are also darker in colour than their "sucking" sisters which are still building up that energy.
If you look at the air below "blowing clouds", you will see the dark shade of rain underneath.

A note of wisdom here: sometimes a dark area below a cloud can be the shadow of the cloud, rather than rain. To distinguish between "rain" and "shadow", I look at the position of the sun versus the cloud: If the shadow beneath the cloud is in a straight line from the sun to the cloud, there is a good chance the dark area below a cloud is a shade, and not rain.
Another way to look at it, is to look at the direction of the shade: if you look at the shade from the bottom of the cloud towards the sea, and the shape of the shade follows the prevailing wind direction, there is a good chance, it is rain. If not, it might be a shade.
Rule of thumb, but no guarantee.

Back to blowing clouds: as these are mature and saturated clouds, they spill energy. If you would be an eagle, and look at the cloud from right above it, the winds would spill, from the centre of the cloud, 360° outwards. The higher and the darker the cloud, the more mature/saturated it is, and the stronger the winds it will spill from the center outwards. Right underneath the cloud, there will be a strong down-draft, with rain, and hardly any wind.

What does this mean for you, sailing transatlantic and thus sailing downwind: You see a dark and large cloud coming in from behind. You see the darker colours of the skies below the cloud, showing rain. This means that in front of the cloud, as you are sailing downwind, the spilling ("blowing") wind will amplify your prevailing (atmospheric) wind. That "amplification" might be anything from 10 to 20 knots: so if you have a prevailing wind of 20 knots and a "blowing cloud" catches up on you, right in front of the cloud, you might get gusts of 30 or 40 knots. Right underneath the cloud, you will get the downdraft (and the rain), reducing your wind significantly, or reducing it to almost nil...
And once the cloud passed you, its "blowing" behaviour, the wind it spills, will kill your prevailing wind for some time, with either "less wind", or "no wind", or in extreme cases, headwind as the spilling wind is blowing against the prevailing (atmospheric) wind

And mind you, this is an example when sailing downwind, and being hit from a "blowing" cloud from behind (sailing downwind, all clouds will hit you from behind).

One note here, though: not all "blowing clouds", will hit you overhead. You will have just as many "blowing clouds", passing you on the side (and I prefer these clouds to pass on my side, I hate to be hit directly with 35-40 knots squalls directly). But by observing the size and colour of the cloud, the colour of the shade below the cloud (density of the rain), you can estimate the strength of the spilling winds it will bring to you. And if you follow my mental eagle-eye picture of "blowing clouds spilling wind 360° from its center, you can then predict what windshifts you might have, as that cloud passes left or right from you.

Sucking clouds

Sucking clouds are young clouds, which are not "mature" or "saturated" yet. They are lighter in colour. They typically do not tower that high. And they don't have signs of rain underneath them.

If you'd "fly like an eagle" (Reference to a 1970'ies song by the Steve Miller Band, but most of the youngsters amongst you, won't remember neither the song, nor the band. - hey remember their song "The Joker"? - "Some people call me the space cowboy. dddadadadum.. " ). Anyways, if you'd be an eagle and flew above a sucking cloud (oh man, I can't get that song out of my head "Time keeps on slipping, slipping, slipping")...

Anyways, so, if you'd be an eagle and fly right above a sucking cloud, you'd see, the air from 360° off the centre of the cloud, being sucked into the cloud. So, if you'd be on a transatlantic crossing, with the prevailing winds coming from behind and a "sucking cloud" approaches you, then, as the cloud approaches you, you will have less wind in front of the cloud.
Underneath the cloud, as air is sucked upwards, you will have slightly less wind, and once the cloud passes, its "sucking" will amplify the prevailing wind speed, and this will increase the wind AFTER the cloud passes (versus "increased wind in front of a cloud, if it is a mature blowing cloud")....

Sucking clouds are typically not as violent as blowing clouds, but they can still kill, shift or amplify your prevailing winds.

Sailing transatlantic East-West. What does this mean for you?

Those who know me, know that E-W transats, "are my thing". Not only because, by now, I've done six of them, but also, because for many cruisers and crew, this will be their first (and for many more, last), major open ocean passage. Being a moderator for the Noforeignland's "Crossing the Transat East-West" Facebook group, I see firsthand, how this is on the bucket list of many people, and the only open ocean passage they will ever do... Thus, time to spill some wisdom in that context, then.

So... what does this sucking and blowing mean for you, and how do you "work those clouds?"


(1) Clouds on an E-W transat, are born off Africa, and mature as they go across the Atlantic. Thus, the closer you get to the Caribbean, the more the water temperature raises, the more water evaporates in the air, the more mature clouds you will get, and the higher the chance you will be hit by a squall (a "blowing cloud"), thus the higher your vigilance should be to monitor for these "blowing clouds".
(2) During the day, visually check the clouds behind you. Is it a sucking or a blowing cloud approaching you? Can you change your course to avoid blowing clouds?
(3) As the dew point lowers during nights and early mornings, the higher the chances to get hit by a violent "blowing cloud", forming into a squall. In the dark, at night, check your radar every 30 minutes or so. If you see a dense cloud forming, try to change course a little, try to avoid the center of it. If the cloud is that big that you can not avoid it, be prepared. Reef properly. Way on forehand. Get some hands on deck to deal with the squall.
(4) As you approach the Caribbean, and clouds get more mature, and the probability to be hit by a squall gets higher: avoid flying spinnakers during night time. Nobody will punish you if you arrive a day later than planned, because you went slower during night time. But you surely will have more peaceful nights looking at the stars, while sailing on less canvas during the night, rather than trying to gain speed with your spinnaker up at night. As we approach the Caribbean, I always urge us to reduce canvas,

Have a safe transat everyone. And learn to read the clouds. Weather prediction apps are good, but keeping a good eye (or radar-eye) on the clouds behind you, and interpreting the blowing or sucking clouds well, will save your day...

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Not what I expected to see after 10,000 miles of ocean passages.

In each of the past winter seasons, I did one trans-Atlantic trip. I came back from each transat super-fit and in top shape. This year, it all went a bit different.

Already in June, I had committed to Chris and Amy, owners of "Saffron Star", to help them sail their Sun Odyssey 46, from Gibraltar to the Canaries and onwards to the Caribbean. Late June, my friend, work colleague and sailing partner since 30 years, Mats, had bought Manami II, a 46 ft Oceanis. He had set his goal to sail transatlantic in January, and asked me to join him.
I thought: "Ok, this is not what I had in mind, but that seems do-able", and to be honest, sailing two transats in one season is kinda special, something that would challenge me. And I like challenges.

Came August, and Mats had his boat almost ready. But not quite...: Manami II being in Vigo - NW Spain - in the holiday season, was not the best place to get the last preparations/repairs done: technicians were on holiday until September, and spare parts were difficult to import... So, when Mats asked me, early August, to "come and sail with him", I thought he meant some day sailing around Vigo... But, no, tired of endless delays in repairs, Mats wanted to sail the boat to the UK early September, do the work there, and sail back South, to the Canaries, a month later.

We both knew that was going to be a bit of a challenge: as of September, the North Atlantic depressions start rolling in, making the Spain-UK stretch (and vice-versa) a potential challenge: I could see, timing (and weather) would be an issue, and that would have me sailing open ocean passages continuously from September until February. "But so be it", I thought, "time to push my 65-year old body a bit...!".

Vigo to Hamble:

So, on Sept 3rd I joined Mats and two crew we recruited, for some test sails in Vigo and boat/provisioning preps. Despite some pending issues with the navigation system, and despite the fact we had never sailed this boat in open ocean passages before, we agreed to push on. We had a weather window to the UK, and off we went, through the Orca danger area off Cape Finesterra, over the Bay of Biscay, northwards.
It was a rough passage, to say the least: as predicted, we had either no wind, or 30 knots from the nose. We pushed on, with watches rotating 4 hours on and 4 hours off, over Biscay, around Bretagne, through the English Channel and the Solent, to arrive in the Solent 6 days later, at 4:30 AM. This turned out to be probably my roughest passage ever...

Gibraltar to Lanzarote:

I left the UK for a four days lay-over in Rome, enough to repack my bags, and fly off to Gibraltar, to join Chris and Amy on Saffron Star. Three days of boat prep and provisioning, and off we went to La Graciosa, the most Northern island of the Canaries. A nice sail, again with 4h on/4h off watches, with moderate steady winds, and without major issues, apart from the prop shaft disconnecting from the engine. But that was quickly repaired by Chris.
We arrived in the anchorage of La Graciosa, in the Canaries on October 5th, the birthday of skipper Chris and myself. We had a relaxed day with a nice lunch onshore, and the next day, I flew to the UK to re-join Mats.

Hamble to the Canaries (again):

I left Gracioso in shorts and Tshirt. Took a ferry, with crew mate Edu, to Lanzarote, a taxi to the main town, and a plane to London Gatwick. Arrived in London, standing in the railway station with the speakers announcing major storms and disruptions, taking three different train connections, only be dropped off by the taxi at the hostel of the Royal Southern Yacht Club in Hamble (which I did not know at that time, but apparently, this Club is an absolute world icon in yachting/racing)....

So I found myself at the entrance door of the Hamble Royal Southern Yacht Club, at 9 PM, in the rain, with my sandals and T-shirt, poorly covered by a rain jacket, knocking on the locked door, trying to get into the hostel, while nobody answered.
That was probably my "low" moment in the past 7 months. In my sandals, and a thin layer of clothes on, just trying to get into the hostel and shelter, before embarking on a 1,700 Nmiles (3,000 km) trip, back to warmth of the Canaries....
And embarking we did. Two days of prep on Manami II, and we left Port Hamble at 3:30 AM (which was the only tide/weather window we had in the next days), with an air temperature of 3°C, and a "frost warning" on Predictwind.

On Predictwind, I had previously seen gale/high seas/gusts/lightning/fog warnings before, but never a "frost warning"... We cast off knowing that for the next days, we would have to negotiate the Southampton cargo traffic and the Solent's complex navigation markers in the dark, the Solent and Needles tides (which we had planned JUST right!), the English Channel traffic (the busiest and most chaotic maritime spot in the world), onto the Bay of Biscay (one of the most notorious sailing areas in the world), past Finesterra and the Spanish/Portuguese West coast (notorious for its recent orca attacks on yachts)....

All while sailing in 4 hours on, 4 hours off watches, again, with two sea sick crew (during the first 48 hours), one freezing crew, and chaotic cargo/fishing vessels traffic all around us in the English Channel.
But we did it. Mats prepared the boat just right. Anne prepared the provisioning just right. And it was a pleasure to share my watches with Alf...
But not my idea of champaign sailing. Not close to anyone's perception of the romantic idea of sailing. Until 2 weeks later, we reached the island of Graciosa in the North of the Canaries, where I left Saffron Star, just one month ago...Déjà vu!

But in the midst of it, leaving the UK and passing the Channel, I was thinking..: "what the fudge"?!. It was a rough passage, again... I had more clothing layers on than I had during my past two Antarctic expeditions. It was bitter bitter cold. It was wet. It was windy. And the sea was pretty wild.
Each time I pulled myself up from the passage way, after a short sleep, into the pitch dark cockpit at 8 PM, or midnight or 4 AM, only to faintly see two frozen-stiff figures (Mats and Anne, who did the watch before me) in the dimmed lights, knowing that would be my life for the next 4 hours, together with Alf.... In the dark, cold and wet open air....
I thought "what the fudge" at that moment... Why the fu(dge) are we doing this for? Where is the fun in all of this?!

And yet, we survived. We dodged the Southampton and Solent cargo traffic, the Needles, the English Channel, Biscay, Finesterra, and beyond. We had everything from "no wind", to 35 knots, from totally flat seas to beating into 4 meter waves... Only to arrive back and anchor at Graciosa, one month after I left Saffron Star, anchoring on the exact same spot. Though this time, with winds blowing at 25 knots in the anchorage, which is a different story by itself. But the next day, we beached the dinghy, had a gorgeous sea food lunch on shore again.

And all hardship was forgotten in an instance....

Canaries to Barbados:

I flew from Lanzarote to Tenerife and joined Saffron Star (again) after a short break in Tenerife. We waited for 3 weeks in the marina, until we had a good weather window to sail to Cape Verde, and off we went.
Again with 4 people onboard (Chris and Amy, the owners, Nikki, a new crew member and myself). This time, we sailed 4 hours on and 12 hours off - what a luxury.
We had a nice passage with rather low winds up to Mindelo, on the island of Sao Vicente in Cape Verde. We cleaned the boat, took one day off to tour the island, one day of provisioning and off we went again.
We had a dream passage to Barbados with very steady winds and hardly any squalls. The only challenge I had, is that we had been delayed for 3 weeks in Tenerife. During the waiting period, I saw my planned 1 week off-time in Barbados disappear, and my planned 2 weeks Christmas holidays at home in Italy vaporized too. So we arrived in Barbados in the afternoon of December 22nd. I took one day off, and flew back to Rome on the 24th, to arrive back home in the late evening of Christmas day.
I had two days to do my laundry, get a hair-cut, catch up on some sleep, and spent four days of New Year's in Madrid with friends, after which, I flew to the Canaries to join Manami II, again.

Canaries to Grenada:

I arrived in Las Palmas on the evening of January 2nd, where Mats and Anne were waiting. We were joined by Alex, our new 4th crew the next day, and took 2 days to re-provision and prep the boat. We left for Cape Verde (again), on Jan 6th, as part of the Viking Explorers flotilla of 20 boats.
It felt like "déjà vu": I had left the Canaries for the Caribbean, a month ago, and here I was, sailing the same stretch again.
But we had gorgeous weather to Cape Verde. Steady winds, with 4 days and 4 nights without a single cloud in the sky. Talking about champaign sailing! And doing 4 hours on, 8 hours off watches, made it a nice and relaxed passage.
Despite the fact that it was an easy passage, I felt my body started to protest. I hurt my back, pinching a muscle, and my body started to feel real stiff. I did daily stretching exercises, which are not easy on a moving boat :-)
We arrived in Mindelo (again) after 6 days sailing and had about 5 days in the marina. We toured the island (again), and did a day tour to the neighouring island of Sao Antao. We reprovisioned, took fuel, prepped the boat and off we went to Grenada.

Just as, a month ago, the passage from Mindelo to the Caribbean had been relaxed champaign sailing, this passage was much rougher. We hit squalls as of 4 days out of Mindelo - which is rather exceptional. The prevailing winds were stronger, with an average of 25+ knots. The sea state was quite aggitated. Two transats within a month, and such a different weather and sea!

But, it was quite fun. We had a great time chatting with the other boats in the Viking Explorers' flotilla, via our Starlink satellite connection. And overall, it was a good passage...

During the passage, though, I felt like my body started to get weaker. At times, it felt like I was going to flip through my knees, as if no strength was left...

Grenada:

The moment I stepped off the boat in Grenada, early February, I could hardly walk. My left knee gave in, and my whole body was stiff. Luckily I had 10 days off in Grenada before flying back to Europe, so I went for a session with an osteopath/physiotherapist twice. Looking at my body and my movements, she said: "Hmmm, we have our work cut out for us".

And at the moment I write this, we're 4 weeks and 6 physiotherapist sessions later. What happened became clear: I had lost about 7 kgs of muscle weight, mostly on my legs. Pretty obvious why, as while sailing passages, you hardly use your legs: Most of the work is done by your upper body.
That is fine for one transat passage of 2-3 weeks, but by the time we arrived in Grenada, I had been sailing 10,000 Nmiles (or 18,000 km) in 5-6 months, with a constant strain on my body..
While passage sailing, you are constantly "holding on" to something: while moving around the boat, taking a shower or going to pee. Even while sleeping, your body is working, trying not to move around too much in your bunk.

The result on my legs, and how much of my leg muscles had disappeared, you can actually see in the picture on top of this post. You can also see that my left leg lost much more muscle than the right one, causing the left knee to do "overtime". Thus my issues with my knee.

Now, one month after after arriving in Grenada, I am still recovering slowly, with my knee taped up to give it extra support. And I am doing exercises to regain my legs' muscle mass.

Now I get it, how competition sailors doing non-stop around the globe races, can hardly walk on shore after arriving... Not what I had expected to see or feel after my 6 months of ocean passages, but something I can clearly understand now.

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