Catana Catamarans

We took delivery of "Corazon" our Catana 431 in January 1999. A boat such as this would be wasted just "pottering around" and we wanted to do some serious cruising first in the Med and then in the Caribbean. I had sail across the Atlantic with the ARC on a friend's 46ft. monohull in 1995 and was keen to repeat the trip in my own boat.


We spent the summer of 1999 cruising the Med (Corsica, Sardinia, Sicily, Malta, Greek Islands and Turkey), left the boat in Turkey for the winter and in July 2000 sailed back to Canet for some warranty work and to have an SSB radio fitted. In September 2000 we sailed from Canet to Lanzarote and again left the boat till November.
The ARC has been run for the past 15 years. It is extremely popular and sets a limit of 225 entries.

 
Something like 20 countries are represented. Most of these were gathered in Las Palmas, dressed overall with signal flags. By day the crews were loading food, fuel and water, inspecting and fixing the boats, cleaning the bottom, attending lectures on subjects related to an Atlantic crossing. By night they were having fun.

We had prepared well and spent a fairly relaxing week in Las Palmas. Catana had sent a technician to Las Palmas to help any Catanas, but we didn't have too much for him to do.
On Sunday November 19th the boats left the port honking their horns and waving to the crowd on the seawalls.
At 1 PM the Spanish Navy Frigate at the starting line fired its gun and the whole armada started on its 2700 nm trek across the 'big pond', spinnakers flying on a broad reach. Our boat was sailing at 10-12 kts and humming happily with 15-20 Kts wind. At the end of the first 24 hours we were well up the fleet. Within two days the fleet had dispersed and often no other yachts were in sight. The Atlantic was on its best behaviour with up to 20 Dolphins in our bow wave for 30 minutes at a time. Flying fish and birds all along the way, circling the boat and picking the fish in mid flight. We took a relatively direct route which turned out to be a mistake as after the first day the wind was lighter than we had hoped for, mostly 8-15 Kts for the first week or so, only once gusting to 30 Kts in a squall. At one time we had a 5 kt headwind!


The sea with its long swells looked like blue sand dunes with less than 8 feet waves. The boats taking a more Southerly route had stronger winds and we lost much of our early advantage. We were not too concerned as we had decided that our priorities were, safety, fun and speed in that order.

The difference between "Corazon" and the previous boat was amazing. The trade winds crossing on a monohull is very uncomfortable, with the wind permanently from astern and with frequent need to gybe and the risk of broaching. Each gybe would take the whole crew 20 minutes and five years ago we had two accidental gybes. The motion on a monohull is a constant rolling and slamming of booms, spinnaker poles and flogging of sails. After two weeks the lack of any comfortable place to sit down and the constant rolling , wears everyone down. In contrast "Corazon" would pass monohulls with our spinnaker steady as a rock, no rolling and with our crew relaxing on the trampoline or in the spacious cockpit, with hardly the need to tend the sails or the helm. Gybing took 30 seconds and could be done by one person. The autopilot looked after the boat for hours at a time, especially at night. We had two fridges, so fresh food all the way, and the watermaker enabled regular showers. As the weather got warmer as we went South we dined al fresco, with the autopilot in charge.

We had no serious gear failures, but the wear and tear on long passages is severe. We flew the spinnaker most of the time and had two spinnaker guys part and a spinnaker halyard shredded. One mainsail batten broke and one life raft clip popped out. Once both clips are removed the life raft lazarette opens and the raft drops into the drink. Other boats blew spinnakers, lost stays, shrouds and halyards. We inspected the boat every few hours, sheeted lines in and out by an inch to spread the chafe and installed chafe protection on sharp edges.

The sunsets were spectacular. Helming the boat alone on moonless starlit nights, clearly seeing the Milky Way and numerous shooting stars was an unforgetable experience. When the moon was up we were sailing down its silvery path. Daybreak in mid ocean when the skies brighten and the sun rises is peaceful and memorable.

For the last week as we got below latitude 20 degrees the wind freshened, but still only 10-15 kts. most of the time. Our average daily runs increased to about 180 nm.After 17 days we saw St. Lucia. It was just before sunset and the sun went down behind the Island giving a wonderful photo opportunity. With 30 miles to go we had a bottle of Champagne followed by roast lamb with all the trimmings, all the while speeding towards St. Lucia at 10kts. We crossed the finish line in the late evening in time to hit the bar for a few celebratory drinks. We were delighted to find that despite the lighter winds we had experienced, we were the second catamaran to finish, behind a Outremer 55 and ahead of bigger cats such as 47 and 55 ft Lagoons, another Outremer 55 which was late for the start and the damaged Morrisson 60. The ARC attracts many very large boats and in terms of overall size, our 43ft. Catana was only the 142rd. largest boat out of 225. But we finished 58th.across the line, ahead of many much larger boats. As the days passed and the other boats finished we discovered that we had won the multihull division by about two days on handicap.

Now for that Caribbean cruise.