Setting out from Portsmouth, New Hampshire, in 2018, Jeff Bolster and his wife, Molly, hoped to circumnavigate on their Valiant 40, Chanticleer. After port-calls in the Caribbean, Panama, Galapagos, French Polynesia, Cook Islands and the Kingdom of Tonga, they were in New Zealand waiting for South Pacific cyclone season to end when Covid-19 broke out, interrupting their voyage. Dealt lemons, they made lemonade, cruising New Zealand’s northern coast for 19 months, until leaving their boat and flying back to the U.S. Jeff and Molly plan to return to the boat in late 2022. Jeff’s thoughts on pulling off the voyage of a lifetime will appear in a few installments in Soundings. This is the second.
We knew that heading for the South Pacific would mean removing ourselves from repair facilities and easy access to parts for long periods of time. That meant servicing virtually every system and purchasing spares before departure. One should always carry at least simple tools and spare parts, even for weekend jaunts and coastal vacation trips. But as ambitions increase, the process intensifies. Suddenly everything demands a second look, even if it is working. Have your halyards been in the sun for years? Probably time to replace them. Is your VHF an example of legacy equipment? An upgrade may be in order. And what about glues and goops to stick things together, or lubricants and penetrating solutions to get them apart? Is there a sufficient supply on board?
I have steered for the horizon more than 100 times knowing that as night fell we would not see land again for days or weeks. Each time, as the sun set, I asked myself whether we were ready—whether the crew, the vessel and the gear were up to the job at hand. For me, sunset on the first night outward bound is always momentarily sobering, a time of reckoning when I take mental inventory of how we prepared. That done, I smile with satisfaction at the prospect of the voyage ahead.
In addition to enough food and water for the crew, only three things are absolutely essential on a small boat in mid-ocean: Keep the seawater out; maintain your ability to steer and retain your propulsion, whether a power boat’s engine(s) or a sailboat’s rig and sails. That’s it. You and your crew can get by for a long time without a functioning toilet, refrigerator, lights, or pressurized fresh water, provided that you have manual bilge pumps, a manual system to get drinking water from your tanks, and some flashlights. With a stand-alone battery-powered GPS, separate from your boat’s electrical system (or a sextant, a reliable time piece and proper navigation tables) you can find your way without electricity. It was done for centuries. Of course, that would mean no AIS, no radar, no comms, no running lights. Watch-standers would need to increase their vigilance and make contingency plans in the unlikely event that collision avoidance became necessary.
A vital part of preparation is imagining such “what if” scenarios. What if a sail rips, or your alternator stops charging your batteries, or your cooking stove fails, or your engine won’t start? Each of those has happened to us in the past, but, thankfully, due to thorough prep, none of them occurred during our long voyage. To go offshore, you want some diagnostic abilities, some spares and—as a last resort—a plan for how you will make do without that system until you reach port. As a sailor I would certainly prefer to lose my engine than my stove. Eating cold tinned food for days without coffee would be poor compensation for the sea story I could tell.
You’ll sleep better if you have redundant systems. By the time we left for the South Pacific, we could charge our batteries with solar panels, with the engine’s alternator and through the generator’s battery charger. If one system had a hiccup or simply died, the others were ready. Our mechanical Monitor wind vane takes almost all offshore helm watches, but we also have an electronic autopilot. We departed on our long trip flying a new genoa but carried a spare and plenty of sail repair supplies. It’s simple. Don’t put all your eggs in one basket.
Over the years our preparations for going offshore have ranged from major upgrades such as replacing our standing rigging, which we did prior to departure for New Zealand, to mundane tasks such as changing fuel filters. The devil is always in the details. For instance, thorough preparation includes testing your improvements, preferably in real sea trials, before you head for the horizon. Squirting the edge of your hatches with the dock hose at full pressure will not determine whether their new gaskets or bedding is leak-proof. Old Man Ocean doesn’t act like the marina hose. After replacing our sun-damaged Lewmar hatches we pounded to windward in an ungainly sea, dispiritedly discovering sheets of water squirting through the forecastle hatch. Be prepared to occasionally re-do jobs you’ve just proudly completed. It’s all part of the process.
Before the New Zealand voyage, we had prepped four times to sail from New Hampshire to the Caribbean, upgrading our boat each time, never imagining that an ultimate prep loomed ahead. In 2017, Chanticleer lay in Tortola, squarely in the crosshairs of Hurricanes Irma and Maria. Fourteen months passed from her dismasting and other damage until we were underway again. My patience and perseverance never had been so tested. The silver lining in the cloud is that we systematically upgraded much more than we otherwise would have prior to setting off ’round the world. That prep paid off during our 33 months underway, characterized by no major failures except for our windlass, whose cast bronze chain gypsy broke. Thankfully, it failed in New Zealand, a developed nation, not in a remote Cook Island atoll.
Preparation can seem relentless, but it is often quite satisfying. If you are the sort of person who likes to buy things, an ambitious trip justifies purchasing previously unnecessary safety gear, as well as tools for tackling projects in out-of-the-way places. Among other purchases prior to departing New Hampshire, we bought a rechargeable remote jump starter for the engine. We haven’t used it yet, but I am glad to have it aboard. Upgrading our communications, we bought an Iridium Go satellite hotspot through Predict Wind, for calls, weather data and email. We used it everyday.
A new boat will require fewer upgrades than an older vessel, but still, one must assemble a medical kit and ditch bag, stock tools and emergency gear, confront provisioning for the long term, and acquire paper charts and cruise guides to supplement electronics. We had a wonderful shopping spree at Islamadora, the nautical bookstore and official chart agent on the Panama Canal, where we bought French and British Admiralty charts for remote corners of the South Pacific. In Tonga and other out-of-the-way places they were more accurate sometimes than the electronics, and we always consulted both.
Don’t forget inoculations for tropical diseases in the fantastic places you wish to visit. We thought we had covered this. Not entirely, it turns out. In Tahuata, one of our favorite Marquesas Islands, a local nurse explained that elephantiasis remained endemic, but could be prevented with a once-a-year pill. Molly and I willingly took the pill, for free, courtesy of the French government.
There is a knack to preparing a deep-sea boat for operation by a small crew. Be thorough. Be patient. And keep your eyes on the prize. Your greatest regret may well come from not making the voyage of your dreams.
This article was originally published in the November 2022 issue.
