Day 4 - North Sea

Friday 5^th June 2015 – North Sea – Day 4

The early hour watch was clear, starry and moonlit but the wind and seas from the west were building up and the auto helm was having problems holding our course, with the bows yawing in the swell.

At 04.00, we were on hand steering passing the Outer Dowsing north cardinal mark and keeping her running done the channel either side of the shallow banks.

Dave was not too happy about taking the helm in these conditions, with a little encouragement, he got the hang of it, apart from the fact, no way only two of us were going to steer all the way to Holland.

Shortened Sail

At 10.30 we had to shorten sail to three reefs in the main, while the No.2 foresail was looking after itself.  Luckily by 12.00 the wind was being to abate and the auto-helm was put back into use.

North Sea rig of the day

While passing oil rigs of which there are many, in mid-afternoon two of the reefs were shaken out the mainsail.

While everything appeared to be calming down, ran the engine for two hours in the evening to charge the batteries.

Big ship Channel

There are two main deep water channels you have to cross which the big ships use while navigating in the middle of the North Sea. We found them to be quiet with very little traffic to worry about.

A warm evening meal of pasta bake set us all up for the night watches.

The navigation lights went on at 21.30 and by midnight we were passing the Brown Ridge west cardinal mark slightly disadvantaged, as it was not lit, but we were closing in on the Dutch coast.