Curare's Adventures

General Information

Our boat, S/V Curare is a 36 foot sloop designed by Holman and Pye and built in 1974 by Bowman Yachts in Emsworth, England.

She is a registered yacht of 9.97 tons and is heavily constructed of solid glass reinforced plastic (GRP-fiberglass). She is rated as a three stateroom vessel, but in reality there is only the main salon and the forward V-berth with an enclosed head. The interior is finished in teak veneer plywood with sold teak grab rails, fiddles and posts. The exterior has a solid teak toe rail, teak coamings and teak decks. The teak toe rail, coamings, dorade boxes and other exterior teak trim has been varnished in the past, but this year we have decided to let it age to a graceful and natural grey, thus eliminating a huge maintenance chore.

History

Bowman Yachts are not very common on the West Coast, but share many similarities to the more familiar Camper-Nicholson which were also constructed in Emsworth. Bowman has a well earned reputation for producing high quality vessels capable of enduring North Sea gales. During the 1970’s they offered various models and configurations that ranged from the 28 foot sloop to a 57 foot ketch. Geoff had the opportunity to sail on the 57’ ketch, Papagayo, across the Indian Ocean and up the Red Sea in 2000. Her construction was exactly the same as Curare, only much larger, and it even felt like the same craftsman carved the navigation table hand rail.

In the early 1980’s Bowman Yachts went through some reorganizations resulting in a name change to Rival Bowman. They continued to produce high quality yachts with more modern designs to meet the popular IROC style, such as the Starlight series. Financial difficulties and more reorganization resulted in Rival Bowman going into receivership in 2002, subsequently purchased by Rustler Yachts who continue the solid reputation that Bowman Yachts had developed, often being referred to in UK yachting magazines as the Bentley of yachts. To learn more visit Bowman Yachts

Specifications

LOA: 36 feet LWL: 26’ 8” Beam: 11’ 4” Draft: 5’ 10”

Construction: Glass Reinforced Plastic (GRP) built under supervision of Lloyd’s Register of Shipping to their 100 A.1 standard

Displacement: 18,600 lbs; Gross T 10.03 tons; Registered T:9.87 tons

Engine: Yanmar 4JHE 4 cylinder diesel, 55 hp with 1 ¼” shaft and PYC Dripless seal (2005) on cutless bearing (2006) with 3 blade Campbell fixed prop.

Designed Hull Speed: 6.2 knots

Tankage: Fuel – 190 liters (40 gallons); water – 340 liters (75 gallons), both tanks integral in hull

Rigging: Proctor deck stepped mast with self tailing Anderson 12 winches on main halyard, Barent 12 winches for genoa and spinnaker halyards, standing rigging is 7/16” 1x19 - 316 stainless wire (2002) with a detachable inner stay (2006)

Sails: Main – 450 sq feet, triple reef, ¾ batten, made by Ehlstrom/Leitch McBride in 2006; Genoa – 275 sq feet, 140% on Profurl NC42 roller furling, sail new in 2005, furler new in 2006; inner staysail – 125 sq feet, cut down from original sails with new hanks to attach to inner stay; Garhuer spring loaded vang.

Electrical: Balmar 110 amp alternator with Maxcharge regulator (2006); Kyocera 75 watt solar panels (2006); 4 golf cart style batteries (2002) for house supply at 420 amp-hours plus dedicated 12 volt engine start battery (2002); Link 2000 with Heart 2500 invertor/charger (2000); 110 volt shore power with 4 receptacles.

Navigation/Electronics: Furuno 1834C radar/charplotter; Icom 802 SSB with Pactor IIex modem; Icom M-502 VHF with mast head antennae; Icom M-402 VHF in cockpit with arch mounted antennae; Autonav 1500 hydraulic autopilot with gyro compass (2001); Sestral gimballed compass, Davis sextant; various handheld GPS units; Hyrdovane windvane (2007). 

Safety Equipment: Viking Rescyou Pro 4 person offshore liferaft; ACR 406MHz Epirb; Mustang inflatable harnesses (4); Lifesling rescue collar; lifering with heaving line; ditch bag with emergency supplies; propane sniffer with auto shut off solenoid; 4 fire 5lb ABC extinguishers; 44 lb Lewmar Claw on 60 meter 5/16” high test chain and 80 meter 5/8” rode plus 35 lb CQR on 300’ rode; Henderson Mark II manual bilge pump in cockpit, Rule 4000 electric pump in bilge; Aquasignal masthead tricolour light with strobe.

Other equipment: Force 10 European Subcompact 2 burner galley stove (2007); Village Marine Little Wonder LWM160 water maker (2007); Whitlock reciprocal style wheel steering on 1 3/8” SS rudder stock; Dickenson propane cabin heater.

First post

This is the blog of Curare, a 36 foot sailboat, but will be authored by the crew.  As the crew is new at blogging they don't really know how or where to begin. 

I suppose you are asking - why a blog? Why not a web site?  The reason for this was obvious to Linda (the first mate), someone who has kept a diary on and off since she was 10, but less obvious to Geoff (the Captain). A web site is static and it takes a lot of work to maintain, a blog is dynamic and can be updated easily, even from the boat while underway. This blog will be used to create a space for this sailing journey so that we can always remember what it was like.

So why not just keep a personal handwritten diary? We want the use of a public forum to involve family and friends in what for us will be an exciting adventure. At this time next year we will be someplace else (at this time we have no plans), experiencing new and exciting things, and we just do not have the time to write everyone a personal note. This way you can decide on your own your level of participation in our trip.

We also want a place where the we can vent our frustrations during this preparation phase because some days it does not look like the sailing phase will ever happen. There is SO VERY MUCH to do and we want to cast off at the end of August.

The first few months may be very boring as all we are doing is working on the boat, but on the other hand the more frustrations and setbacks that we encounter the higher the stress level, and the livelier the reading should be. If all of that still isn't something you want to spend your time reading then check back in September when we should be somewhere off the coast of Washington Sate, heading south to Mexico.

Keep in mind that although some entries may be written by Geoff the majority of them will be written by Linda. Jessie, the third crew member, is our 7 year old dog and she has not yet learned to write.

What am I doing Here?

After spending all day working at a computer what does Linda do? She goes home, eats fried cabbage and chicken for dinner and  works on the computer. She really need to get a life, or get back to the kind of life that she used to have; hiking in the mountains, looking at rocks, collecting flowers, avoiding wildlife , drinking from mountain streams, getting sunburnt, sleeping in a tent,  flying to work in a helicopter, treading where no one has stepped before and being outdoors NOT stuck in a chair.

Geoff is out of town at the moment, working in Chile, hence the fried cabbage for dinner - not the Captains favourite food.                                                                        

Jessie and THE WET

Jessie hates getting wet. We have been her care givers since she was one year of age and it was only last summer that she stuck her belly in the water. Last night Linda was arranging and categorizing some of the digital photos and she found this one of Jessie "swimming" in Herring Bay.

Jessie likes dinghy rides and tolerates being on Curare but Linda often wonders if it is in Jessie's best interest to be a crew member on this sailing trip?
Our first journey will be offshore sailing from Vancouver directly to Ensenada Mexico, without any landings in the good ol' US of A. This may take 2 weeks, at which time we will have to reassess the crew's enthusiasm.

Interfacing Equipment

Today I finished making a interface wiring diagram for the Furuno 1834 C/NT chartplotter/radar with the computer, SBB and the AUTONAV 1500 autopilot.  After fruitlessly searching for retail places to purchase. heat shrink, wire and connectors I found an electronics shop, Main Electronics, and bought everything I needed in one place. Now we can get going and string wires throughout the boat.

Haul Out Day

Today we hauled Curare so that we could do all of the work that needs to be finished before our end of August departure. It was not a very nice day and as Geoff was bringing her over to the haul out marina it was snowing. Here is a photo of Geoff inspecting the propeller

On the list of things to do are the following:remove the mast, install a new Raytheon wind instrument at the mast head, add an Aquasignal LED tri-color light at the mast head, run new VHF wiring (RG-8U) to the mast head antenna, install the ICOM 802 radio (including ground plane) and Pactor II-ex modem and get it working, integrate the Autopilot and the Furuno chart plotter, integrate the gyro compass heading data with the radar, install a Village Marine Little Wonder modular watermaker (LWM160) and an extra water tank for product water, tear apart and re-insulate the icebox in preparation for the Frigoboat keel cooled refrigeration system, add a Hydrovane windvane to the stern, install 2 new portlights, re-configure the galley and install new Force 10 stove, make some minor modifications to the head, install new bilge pumps, install a second set of Anderson winches at the cockpit, re-do the deck salon hatch because it leaks, inspect all through hulls and add two additional ones, and other minor things that will take much longer to finish than we expect.

Will we get all of this finished? We had better or we won't be going.

Radio Course

This weekend Linda went to Victoria and took a practical radio course put on by the Blue Water Cruising Association. Saturday was spent in the classroom reviewing radio theory, learning how to, and then practicing,  soldering a proper coaxial connection, and finally building an emergency dipole HF antenna. Sunday we visited three different sail boats and had a look at their radio set-ups. The instructor provided input as to what was good and what was not-so-good about each installation.
I think I learned a lot and am determined to solder all of our radio connections which means re-doing the VHF connection at the top of the mast. Luckily the mast is currently off the boat, lying on the ground waiting to have the back stay made into an antenna, which means I can solder with both feet on the ground.
Note to self: Buy a soldering iron.

Refrigeration at Last (a Start)

Curare has never had a refrigeration system. Who needs one when you are sailing in the Pacific Northwest?  However warmer climates are on our itinerary and we decided to install a Frigoboat keel cooler refrigeration system in our old ice box space . This meant deconstructing the ice box and removing the foam insulation - Geoff did that. Turns out the easiest way to remove the insulation was a chain saw. No photos but plenty of noise, and weird looks from neighbouring boat workers. We do not have very much room to install new insulation, I think it is a 3 inch space, and Glacier Bay panels are far too expensive for our limited budget, but we have found a product called Heat Shield that sounds like it will work and will fit within the cruising kitty.

Before the Chain saw