Sea Trials with new sails

18 nautical miles

The aim for our sea trials with the new sails was to sail to Agia Napa and back. The wind looked fairly reasonable for this, with a northerly 12 knots gusting 15. We started early, motoring out of the marina before 8:30, but the wind was higher than forecast, being 15 gusting 18, so we decided to start with new genoa and the old mizzen.

This worked very well indeed. We had also changed the running backstays, to being two rather than one. This made tacking a whole lot easier. The mizzen sheet we had changed to a bridle fitting. This wasn't quite right and we will work with this to get it right.

The wind dropped slightly so we decided to raise the new main sail too... the stack packs made this a lot easier.

Actually, when we came to drop the main, since the wind picked up, and despite gusts, it dropped easier than we ever have before, this was definitely a major plus for the new stack packs.

The new main, a Long Distance Cruising Sail set beautifully. The shape significantly better than the old sail.


King Malu felt very much more in control than she had with the previous sails.

However, it was definitely cold... at least for those of us who are Mediterranean summer sailors. I toughed it out to start with then gave in and put on my foul weather gear!  I think I need some better base and mid layers.

Jacob, who normally runs around in shorts even when there is snow on the ground even had on a hoodie, though he wasn't running his feet in the water.

The genoa was very slightly smaller than the old sail, but being a Performance Cruising Sail, made out of Hydra Net, it set better and the speed was slightly higher than before.

Being cut higher also meant that we could see under the genoa, which made keeping watch easier.

For the final 30 minutes or so we even raised the mizzen staysail for the broad reach back to the marina. This gave us about half a knot of extra speed.

Coming into the marina we always try to keep at least part of the genoa up. It's often a little choppy just outside the marina and with an outboard on the back it tends to cavitate. The genoa holds King Malu on a constant angle and also helps to hold the bow down. The new Furlex meant it furled very much easier, so I think we can hold off final furling of the genoa till we are through the marina mouth now.

So, if you want to know the summary of our feelings about the new sails...

just look at the smiles!

Sea trials for the Outboard

15 Nautical Miles

Today was sea trial for the new Honda outboard we fitted yesterday. The plan was to motor round to the other side of the harbour, drop anchor (to test anchor system). Weigh anchor and sail, testing the autopilot and the mizzen sail, check hove to... and return before 3pm... and... have a good time.

The new Honda started flawlessly, and took us out of the berth easily, and then the boat skewed strangely... we found that the trop line from the mooring line had en-cycled the outboard shaft (not the prop-shaft fortunately). Once free King Malu responded happily and we motored round.

It was beautiful dropping anchor in crystal clear water and seeing the anchor chain dropped across the sea floor. We do need some markers for the anchor chain to work out exactly how much we have payed out. Tim, Jacob and Mick went for a swim and then we tided the boat and set sail.

Working out which tankers were at anchor proved interesting. Sometimes even with binoculars it was difficult to see the anchor chains and impossible to see the black ball from the for'ard mast. I think AIS is a 'must have' in busy waterways.

The autopilot did its thing correctly, very smoothly but at times didn't hold course to wind as well as I would have liked.

Early on I was unhappy that it could hold a better course than I could manual steering, but this wasn't always the case and at other times I was slightly frustrated with the way it held course and I could hold the course better.

Part of today was learning more of the new boat handling - we put up the mizzen sail and we wondered if some of the handling differences are due to the mizzen sail.

The mizzen has a very big roach and setting this sail was not quite as easy as I think we expected.

After we had passed one of the tankers we went into the wind to try to furl the main sail. We quickly learnt that it's tonnes easier doing this with the motor running and you you are moving through the water.

'3 degrees to port Mr Helmsman...' On the way back to port Jacob had a go at helming this much bigger yacht than the 16 foot Wayfarer he normally sails with me.

Mick asked, 'So are you both happy with the new motor?'

'I'll tell you when we are in the marina...'

The wind was gusting about 20 knots but the Honda allowed us about 2 knots into the wind at about 2/3 throttle and 5 knots when we turned.

We were deliberately not pushing the engine as its new. The wind was much higher coming into the marina than we have done before, but the outboard performed beautifully with reverse thrust to slow us to a stop without touching the quay.

Walking back to the car along the quay Tim said, 'In answer to your question... 99.9%'

All in all we are both very pleased with the new motor... this is the third motor we have worked on to try to get King Malu sailing... had the first one worked we would be where we are today but six months ago.

Second sea trial

10 nautical miles

Target today was to calibrate the navionics. This meant we needed to do two or three very slow circles. As we started off from the marina there was a significant sea mist. We don't have radar this year so we stationed John at the bow as lookout.

Then we started the slow circles. The autopilot calibrated and we hoisted sails and started off towards Cape Pila. Yes! The autopilot was now working fine and would steer course or to wind.

Next thing was to create a compass deviation chart. So we started on that under sail.

The motor was too hot to use, but it would have been easier and quicker to do this under power. We really must find something to keep the motor cool.

With 8 deep discharge batteries, plus the power controller there is not a lot of space in the engine room.

But now this was glorious sailing. We had ice-cool watermelon while we sailed along.

We started the generator to test that under way and to recharge the batteries that we had used quite a bit for the navionics calibration. That worked perfectly. Could even run the fridge freezer at the same time as recharging the batteries.

Louis needed to be back by 1pm so we turned for home. I had hoped a sail past Larnaca Nautical Club, but time would not permit.

About half a nautical mile out from the marina we started the motor, dropped the sails and I took the helm. I had the throttle at about 40% keeping it low because I know we still have this motor heating problem and when it gets too hot the controller throttles the motor back automatically and the last thing I want is to lose power while maneuvering into the berth, especially as we want to try to berth stern to this time.

At 40% throttle we had just about 2 knots of speed. Not exactly mind blowing, but adequate. We really do need more power.  I would have liked to motor up to the marina at about 4 knots and slowed to 2 and then 1 as we entered. I felt we were just chugging along, and because of the over-heating I don't really feel I trust the motor yet.

I slow down to about a knot as we turn into our area of the marina and then slow still more as we come close to our berth... turn ready to reverse... put the throttle into reverse and... nothing... the motor died. 

Because the wind was moderate we immediately started to drift towards the other boats and the slipway which would have done significant damage to our yacht and others except for the quick thinking of Tim who jumped into the water and swam to an anchor chain and we threw him a line which he secure to that chain... and we eventually managed to berth the boat in between two others not at our own berth. 

We stayed on the yacht all afternoon worried that the real owner of the berth would return. I talked a friend Chris into a tow at 5pm when the wind had dropped. Where we were it did appear to drop. When he started to tow we realised the wind had not dropped we were just in a sheltered position. We should have taken his advice and not tried it. 

With the help of a couple of Lebanese on a power boat we managed to beth between two very big power boats.  Other than damaging our brand new gangplank no other damage was sustained to our yacht... or anyone else. Thank God.

We left her there for the night.

First sea trial

11 nautical miles

The day started off with Tim and me clearing up King Malu so that when we sailed tools and other things would not fly around the cabin. Then when our crew arrived, Jacob, Louis and Sidney we got the sails ready, put on lifejackets and motored out. The motor was still getting hotter than we wanted, but it did the job. 

Up with mainsail and genoa and we started sailing. Yes... King Malu under sail again! She is a very well behaved if heavy boat. What with the fridge and freezer working it was wonderful to enjoy a glass of ice cold lemonade as we sailed.

We wanted to try to get the mizzen up, but could not because we need an extra halyard, since we had stolen the mizzen halyard for the gangplank. We tried removing the mizzen topping lift, but that was stuck firmly.

We tried the autopilot, but that went crazy taking us totally the wrong way. However, the main sheet system was brilliant, total control and very easy from the helm.

On the way back we passed the Zenobia dive boats. The wreck of the Zenobia is supposed to be one of the ten best dive sites in the world.

One of the boats was Alpha Divers, run by Chris, a friend of mine. I almost called him up on the radio, but we were having fun and he was working!

King Malu tacked nicely and so on the way back (I was skipper for the day) I decided to try a jibe. Yes, she jibed nicely too... a textbook jibe with the boat gently coming round rather than the boom bashing across.

So I positioned her right and did a final jibe and a broad reach back to the marina. The motor worked OK, but there was too much wind to reverse in, so we just put her bow to the dock. The afternoon we spent on pottering jobs.

OK, so I re-read the manual for the autopilot and in commissioning realised that the motor control was the wrong way round. Changed that and the autopilot went the right way. Costas from Raymarine came round and I found out that the reason we couldn't get the autopilot to steer to wind was that it was configured (dealer config which he changed) as a power boat not sail boat. And... the reason that we couldn't see wind and depth on the A70 was that the autopilot didn't repeat those values on the NMEA output. OK, so tomorrow we will calibrate the autopilot.

All in all a wonderful day's sail.