To Durban and back
We joined the Zululand Yacht Club's sail to Durban and back over Christmas. Our boat was just ready enough for a long trip, but comfort is overrated. Right? Sailing is all about the weather and waiting for the right weather window to head south to Durban. This delay caused most of the other boats to drop out but we were still a merry flotilla heading off 22 December midday; Shiloh (34 ft), Betwixt (35) and Princess del Mer (35). We sailed in that order all the way to Durban. The estimated time to sail to Durban is 20 hours. We left the bay in a gentle southerly breeze sailing with the Jib. As we had no self-steering yet, we took turns with the tiller. After about 3 hours we put up the Main sail, and John was aghast to find that there were no reefing lines. A bit of a panic and confusion, but it was sorted and the Main went up. It turned out that he had forgotten to put the lines in after working on the reefing poin...