Sea Conditions Ideal

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31360, 4 May 1967, Page 13

Sea Conditions Ideal

(From SIR FRANCIS CHICHESTER) ABOARD GIPSY MOTH IV, May 2. I have 3081 miles to go before I reach Plymouth. Gypsy Moth has made 678 miles in four days in ideal’sailing conditions. My position is 15.00 north, 34.53 west. There is a pleasant breeze, smoothish sea and lovely weather. It is getting cooler and I need something to wear when I go out on deck at nights now. Yesterday was grim for me. When I woke I thought my right elbow had a cracked or broken bone. I treated it with arnica and put a 6yd bandage on it, and this eased the pain. I knew that, because such a thing is so serious, I could be imagining it, so I set about finding out what that arm could do. I was relieved to find that I could pull with it—in other words, I could hold on with

it. But it hurt if I pushed, twisted or moved the arm sideways. Besides by arm I felt as if I was poisoned. I moved unsteadily, was light-headed and had a mild roaring in my ears. After each job 1 had to do on the boat I flopped back in my bunk,. I managed to do everything necessary, but still with much cursing and groaning, and the day’s run was 181 j miles. At the same time I thanked God that conditions were ideal, requiring no great operation. At dark I wanted to run up a light because of crossing the New York-Cape Town steamer route. My two separately-wired cross tree lights had failed, as had the mast head light, also the compass light and the stand-by compass light. Unfortunately, I relied on the electricity and did not bring any stand-by oil lamps from England. All the lights were put right in Sydney and I could foresee no trouble. The best thing I could do in Sydney was to buy two back yard kerosene lanterns made in Hong Kong. I hung one of these in the

mizzen rigging, using lengths of tarred twine to keep it from swinging wildly. I will get the other up as well when I can face it. Today I felt much fitter and my elbow was better. I was able to change a sail without knocking the elbow and I have rebandaged it tonight. The navigation here is intriguing. Today the sun passed within half a degree of an angle of the boat, the equivalent of 30 miles of the earth’s surface. In a few minutes it swung from nearly due east to nearly due west. I got five sights within 16 minutes and the noon point was one mile from four of these sights. I am using a gem of a sextant It is a little model made for flying boats in the war and it was presented to me for a nominal sum by Maria Blewett, who is a well-known navigator and one of the few women navigators in the world. My standard sextant is out of action because the seawater has eaten away the mirror. (Copyright Sir Francis Chichester and the Times Newspapers, Ltd., 1967.)