Trip to Isla Socorro

We made it to Socorro!  We delivered the fuel cans and the make-shift mast and everything ashore, and in a few days, Niniwahuni will hopefully arrive and collect everything and then make it back to La Cruz after that.  

As to the trip here...  It was quite an adventure!  We started out a little late from the marina because we had to get paperwork done, then we had to get a make-shift mast, and by the time we left, the winds had come up and it was quite difficult to get the boat out of the dock.  So after a while of trying to figure that out we finally did and departed around 12:30.  The winds were quite strong in La Cruz, as they always are in the afternoon, and so we put a reef in the main and rolled out the jib and away we went!  Then the winds became light and we motored along trying to get away from the land.  The point of land south of Vallarta (Cabo Corrientes) sticks way out and the trade winds don't really get going until you get west of that point, so we were slow for a while, but eventually the winds came up and stabilized and off we went into the sunset.  We put the starlink up, and I'm a big fan of it.  It burns a lot of power and I need to figure that part out, but the internet is great, and it worked the whole way here.  We are 350 miles away from the Mexican coast.  

That night was nice, I didn't sleep hardly at all, and here's a shot of the boat sailing.  I will miss those nice draft stripes at night!

Another night shot.  It was almost a full moon

Looking forward

The next day the wind came up stronger, and the seas got really chunky.  8 to 10 ft waves were fairly common, and the wind was up to 25 kts at times, but then would drop down to 13.  Very strange winds.  There were also a lot of "trade wind clouds" that are small puffy clouds about 500 ft up and evenly spaced.  It was pretty dewey as well.  Then at about midday, the first trouble struck.  The mainsail, which had been great, started to change shape and in a few minutes it turned into a miserable mess of fibers.  The patch didn't hold.  So we dropped the sail, and in doing so, I got seasick.  then we put up another sail, and it was my MainJib. 

The mainjib did well the rest of the day and the next night, when the winds started to calm down.  So basically the winds came up to tear the mainsail and then with that job done, they wiped their collective brow and smiled proudly on their work and went away.  

The winds slowed gently and the sea state (also proud of extracting my lunch) became satisfied and calmer, and the full moon night began.  

It was a really nice night, very bright and good winds good speeds.  I really suffer in choppy conditions, the boat just keeps running into waves and tossing lots of water on deck, and speeding up and then slowing down.  It doesn't make for good average speeds.    Around 9 am we caught sight of the island, and by noon we were close...

And so I decided to approach and go along the shore.  I had been told that there weren't any rocks to watch out for and it was quite deep along the shoreline.

So I went boldy along, in about 90 ft of water and then took my eyes off the depth sounder for a minute and suddenly we were stopping and there was a crunch and then we had a bit of a wave lift us up and down again and we leaned over as the keel was on the bottom, and I was able to motor in reverse off the rock.  I don't know how big it is, but about 1000 ft off the shore near the SouthEast side of the island.  Watch out.  Lloyd's Rock.  

Anywho, we motored over to the spot where the Navy has their base, and dropped the anchor in about 65 ft, and then we waited for the Navy.  While we waited, I dove on the keel and looked at the damage.  The bulb on the front sticks forward about 2 ft, and at the very front it is where I hit.  It looks like the way the keel is built is that there's a steel beam and a lead block, and then they built a nice fiberglass fairing over the whole shebang, with some foam and then filling epoxy and finally a light layer of fiberglass.  The front of that took the impact and broke, exposing the foam and ripping off a few pieces of the outer fiberglass and filling epoxy.  I couldn't find any metal, however, so I think they built a bit of a "cushion" in the front for just this happenstance.  I love the designers and builders at Pogo Structures.  They build a great strong and fast and pretty boat, and its always surprising me with new feets of strength.  

So I feel good about the structure of the keel, but I am still going to be sailing the boat more easily just to be sure, and checking on the bolts as we go.  I'll keep everyone updated.  

I think we might leave tomorrow around mid-day to return.