Stage 2 – Thursday Island to Cocos-Keeling Atoll
Posted by Graham Cox
It is interesting to note that 68 years after John Guzzwell sailed this leg on TREKKA, the weather patterns are more or less repeating themselves, with a fast ride across the Gulf of Carpentaria being followed by extensive calms in the lee of Australia. It was during this passage that John started setting his small, symmetrical spinnaker above his twin jibs, which allowed TREKKA to keep slipping along at a reasonable daily average, with the assistance of strong favourable currents. He credited this rig set-up with TREKKA’s amazing speeds from this time forward.
The 580’s don’t carry a symmetrical spinnaker, but a combination of A3 and A5 asymmetric kites in light conditions, set wing and wing, or the A5 and A7 in stronger winds, or A7 and jib when it is fresh, provide a similar advantage, and allow the 580’s to keep moving in the lightest of airs, provided the sea-state is not too chaotic.
Some of the fleet, like Adam on LITTLE WREN, also carry twin jibs, though these were not used much in the Pacific. They might come into their own during the Indian Ocean trade winds, which are notoriously boisterous, as they did in the North Atlantic crossing from the Canary Islands to Antigua during the 2025 Class Globe 580 Transat race, the qualifying event for the MGR.
It was the potential of this set up that persuaded Jakub, at least initially, to keep BIBI closer to the rhumb line (and further away from potentially troublesome Indonesian fishing boats). He figured he could maybe set more sail than the boats further north, and thus keep up with them despite sailing in lighter winds.
In these conditions, Jakub sheets his A5 to the end of the squared-off mainsail boom, and sets the A7 to windward on the jib pole (spinnaker pole – call it what you want). He picked up another jib pole from Gary in Thursday Island, since QUESTION 2 is retiring in Darwin, but after trying it, decided that it is easier to sheet the A3 to the end of the mainsail boom. He can furl it in a squall if needed, and keep sailing without the need to go forward and strike the pole, then simply roll it out again when the wind eases.
The sea was a bit chaotic, though, for Jakub and the rest of the fleet, as they crossed the Arafura Sea, due to the gusty winds during the first days, the shallow waters (less than 50m in places) and the fierce currents that went this way and that. Everybody was reporting hard going. BIBI was all closed up, but getting damp from the constant spray on deck.
Then, on the morning of 23 August, Jakub woke up to a different world. “Morning sun coming through companion way woke me up. BIBI gently heaving on a slight sea. I feel nice and warm, and despite having only four one-hour naps during the night, I feel rested. I popped out and saw completely clear sky and beautiful turquoise sea.
“First, I put up more solar panels to recharge my batteries. Then – as usual – coffee, and check the net for weather, and how the other guys are doing. YB3 shows me in first position?? WHAT! But I quickly realised it refers to the rhumb line to Darwin, and because I’m further south, I’m closest to it.
“Checking the weather, I’ll have a pleasant sail with nice wind and calm sea for next 1.5 or 2 days, and then? Nothing! I’ve spent the last two hours analysing the situation. Should I go North, to follow Adam, where there is probably more winds and favourable currents, but also fishing fleets, FADs, ships, pirates, possibly floating abandoned fishing gears, messy sea and who knows what else. The guys up north are sending reports of oil rigs, boats not showing on AIS, and buoys half the size of BIBI.
“Or should I continue West and hope for some change? In my head, two characters are fighting. One is a competitor who wants to be faster than the others, and another is just a guy who want to be in harmony with moana, and most of all to come back in one piece to my loved ones.”
A day later, with the WINDY weather app showing a complete and extensive calm ahead of BIBI’s bows, and unfavourable currents, Jakub reluctantly headed further north to 10° 4.5’S, before resuming his westerly course. He was hoping that this might spare him the worst of the calms, and maybe even give him a favourable wind slant to break through into the Indian Ocean.
At noon, local time, on 26 August, the YB tracker was showing BIBI making 3.3 knots, having covered 93 miles in the previous 24 hours. This was on a par with all the leading boats, except Adam, his friendly arch-rival, who had squeezed 106 miles from LITTLE WREN. BIBI was still 255 miles astern of CAPUCINETTE, however, so it looks as if the northern route, despite potential security risks, is the fastest way to sail through through this area.
It will be interesting to see if, as a consequence, they can shave days off of John Guzzwell’s overall time for this passage (28 days). Guzzwell, of course, did not have access to WINDY via Starlink. TREKKA did not even have a battery aboard! In those days, small voyaging yachts relied on information from pilot books, and if they were really well-equipped, a well-thumbed copy of the British Admiralty publication, OCEAN PASSAGES FOR THE WORLD.
Before the start of this leg, Jakub tried to persuade the other MGR skippers to agree to sail no further north than 10°S, thus creating an exclusion zone to keep them away from potential risks in Indonesian waters, in much the same way that Golden Globe Race (GGR) boats have to observe an exclusion zone in the Southern Ocean. He was not successful in this. Keri, in particular, wanted the freedom to go wherever the strongest winds and currents were.
Keri certainly followed through with that desire, diving north almost immediately after leaving Thursday Island, and on 24 August ORIGAMI was the closest MGR competitor to the island of Timor, sailing some 40 miles off the coast. Renaud, aboard CAPUCINETTE, was about 50 miles off, and Dan on IMMORTAL GAME about 60 miles, though Dan looked like he was beginning to pull away from the coast. Renaud had initially sailed a mote westerly course, but it quickly became evident that the northern route had major advantages and CAPUCINETTE dove north.
If this seems a bit close, bear in mind that on 25 September 1958, John Guzzwell’s TREKKA drifted past Rote Island, just south of Timor, some 20 miles off the beach, though it was hazy and he did not see land. The difference in his passage is that he approached this position from the west, not the north-east, as the leading MGR boats are, since he did not have access to real-time wind and current information.
Sailing north is a tactic that paid off for Keri. He was neck and neck with Renaud for a long time, and for a brief period on the morning of 24 August, led by 1.8 miles! By 25 August, he had slipped back 17 miles, but given that there is 10 miles of latitude between the two boats, it remains to be seen if one of them gets an advantage not shared by the other.
At least the sea had calmed, making life aboard quite pleasant. Keri had earlier commented that the going across the Arafura Sea had been brutal, with a really ugly sea-state caused by cross swells from the east and south. He posted a video online that showed how difficult it was just to boil a kettle. One bonus of that time, though, was the beauty of the sea, which varied from light aqua to deep blue, to steely grey, to green, as depths and cloud cover varied.
At least there had been enough wind for the Aries windvane to cope at that time. ORIGAMI’s small autopilot would not have stood a chance steering in those conditions. By Monday morning, 25 August, there was not enough wind to operate the Aries windvane, but the autopilot was doing just fine, now that the sea had calmed down. The ocean had become like a gently-heaving lake.
There are times when managing the helm is a bit of a struggle, when neither the Aries or the electronic tiller-pilot cope well with the wind and sea-state. Light winds and sloppy seas are the worst combination for any form of self-steering. Keri then hand-steers until a change in conditions allows him to engage one or the other and get some sleep. This also has to coincide with areas where the density of ship and fishing boat traffic allows him to get his head down for half an hour or so.
He has experienced periods of frustration, where he had to continue helming far longer than he would have preferred, when fatigue dulled his senses and he knew he was not racing efficiently. He had to weigh up the need to remain fresh and alert against the desire to be competitive. As he says, it is a long race, and you need to preserve man as well as boat. He was looking forward to getting out into the open sea.
The wind in Keri’s location on 25 August was almost non-existent. He had the mainsail and the jib up, but the jib was was barely drawing. ORIGAMI, nonetheless, had been doing around 2 knots – courtesy of the current – all morning, and had recently picked up to 3.3 knots.
He was planning to hoist the A3 as soon as the breeze picked up a little. He did not want to hoist it too soon, despite having set his sheeting system up with 2mm Dyneema strops on the 6mm sheets, to reduce drag on the clew. There was not yet enough breeze to get some separation – open the slot – between the A3 and mainsail. Otherwise, the A3 would chafe on the spreader ends.
He noted that he did not have any line heavier than 6mm on the boat, and that things like his reefing lies could be reduced further to 4mm, though there would be more chafe on them, and they’d need replacing sooner. He uses soft shackles for most applications on ORIGAMI, making them up as needed. He carries a drum of 2.5mm Dyneema aboard, courtesy of Rooster Sailing.
He sounded relaxed during his mandatory call on 25 August, despite watching CAPUCINETTE gain a few miles, and the prospect of several days of light winds ahead. We talked about racing, something that is alien to a vagabond sailor like myself, and he had a unique perspective. “It’s not about the competitive instinct, the desire to win. It’s about the pursuit of perfection. And that’s how you can congratulate those who defeat you, too, in that they’ve got closer to that perfect track. And only through racing can you properly measure your performance as a sailor, I think.”
In a social media post, he noted, “My beeline has been to this point, knowing the wind in the Timor Sea would die to nothing. 2.5 kts (of boat-speed) at dawn with not a breath of wind, as the sea birds cruise overhead en route to their patrol areas… I am reportedly in prime pirate territory but confident that the wind will fill in by noon and carry me onward, to Cocos-Keeling and beyond. No Monday morning blues here.”
On August 23, Dan, in 3rd place, reported, “A busy couple of days weaving in between Indonesian fishing boats and trying to get into a current that flows into the Timor Sea. In hindsight, I needed to be further north but was a bit nervous going closer to land. Woke up the night before last with nothing showing on AIS, but upon sticking my head out the boat, the ocean was lit up like a Christmas tree, with boats all over the horizon. It ended up being a nice evening on deck though, with bioluminescence lighting up IMMORTAL GAME as I made my way through.
“Yesterday, a couple of guys from two boats got pretty cranky with me, and although I couldn’t understand them, from what I could tell, they were telling me to get out of there, which I was happy to oblige.”
Later that day, he posted, “After a challenging week in rough, messy sea conditions (with winds gusting to 25 knots, during which he ran with reefed main and jib only), I have just had one of the best 24 hours of the race so far. Since moving into deeper waters and a favourable current, the seas have flattened out and made for champagne sailing. To top it off, I didn’t see a single fishing boat last night, and then this morning, I caught my first ever Yellowfin Tuna! Not a big one but a perfect size for me and it tasted delicious.”
Pilar has once again been performing well, with PETER PUNK hanging onto 4th place, while edging further way from the trailing group, a process that began after leaving Fiji. On that passage, concerned that the boats astern of her were closing the gap, she took a gamble and dove south towards an area with a stronger wind gradient, while other boats were edging north. It meant that she had to cross a light weather patch, with the risk of parking up, but she succeeded and roared into Raine Island Entrance, then up to Thursday Island, with 24 knots of steady wind over the deck.
Thursday Island proved a challenging stopover, with PETER PUNK dragging anchor three times in heavy wind gusts. Eventually she bought another anchor which held better. Along with crocodiles making shore access dependent on limited taxi services, and the long fetch and fierce tides that would have made paddling ashore in her little inflatable dinghy treacherous, she was pleased when her mandatory 5-day stopover was complete and she could sail away.
Since then, she has worked hard, once again, at closing the gap with the leading three boats. On 21 August, she ran 135 miles, the longest 24-hour run of the fleet that day, and until the wind began to ease off, PETER PUNK regularly logged over 120 miles a day. On 25 August she was only 96 miles astern of CAPUCINNETE, though further to the south and not benefitting from the 1.5 – 2 knot favourable current the leaders were enjoying.
It looks like she will struggle to break through the light air patch of ocean to her west, but if conditions favour her, she may well close enough to challenge for the lead. Despite all this hard work, she looked happy and relaxed in a recent Instagram post, reclining on her bunk, while setting the alarm for a short snooze.
Adam continues to hang onto 5th place, which he claimed from Jakub when LITTLE WREN squeaked past BIBI on the way up to Thursday Island inside Great Barrier Reef waters. That had long been an ambition of his, and he has consolidated his lead since then by following Keri, Renaud and Dan onto the northern route, close to Timor. Adam is now 65 miles ahead of Jakub, and was steaming along at 5.2 knots, the fastest boat in the fleet on the morning of 25 August, despite having less of a current boost than the leading three boats.
LITTLE WREN was on a close reach, sailing under A5 and single-reefed mainsail. Luckily, the sea had flattened out nicely. It made a change from the chaotic seas of the first few days, during which he pressed the boat a bit harder than usual because it seemed to handle the short, steep chop better with more way on.
He usually had either the A7 or the A3 up, and hung onto the A7 even when the winds were up around 25 knots. He found that moving a bit of weight up to the windward berth, such as his life raft, grab bag and batteries, helped steady the boat’s course. That forced him to improvise an athwartships bunk across the boat, as others have successfully done. He was hoping that the fresher winds he was experiencing would get him into the river of current that is coursing WSW along the coast of Timor before he sailed into the light winds ahead.
He remains pleased with his South Atlantic windvane unit. Since the South Atlantic manufacturers sent him out a beefed-up central bracket to Tahiti, the unit has had no further structural issues, and a recent tweak, where he moved the attachment point for the control lines on the tiller about 1.5 inches, to allow more travel, the gear is steering the boat better than ever.
Adam, and Josh on SKOOKUM, are the only two skippers still using the South Atlantic self-steering units, but they have clearly demonstrated that it is suitable for boats like the 580. When asked how often he’d hand-steered LITTLE WREN in the testing conditions in the Arafura Sea, he said, “I’d say I’ve been hand-steering for maybe two hours altogether in the last week. To be honest, in those washing-machine-type seas, whenever I tried, I didn’t do as well as the wind vane could do, so I gave up and admitted that I was second-best helmsman on the boat.”
He has seen plenty of shipping. “The night before last, I came across 10 to a dozen AIS signals in the space of about a 30-40-mile radius. It was clear it was a long-line fishing operation, with mother ships and lots of floating AIS targets, which I guess is where they hang the long-lines from. I did some research on this, and my understanding is these long-lines are between 50 and 200 meters below the surface, so I haven’t been concerned about sailing across a long-line and getting it caught in my keel. I’ve been more concerned about hitting the AIS buoys, which are often unlit.
“What was quite convenient for me was there was a cargo ship coming directly towards me, about 15 miles away, so he was just entering this mishmash of AIS targets from the west as I was entering from the east. The fact that he went through the middle without incident suggests that as long as you don’t hit any of the targets themselves, then taking a direct route through these things is okay. At least that’s what I did and it was okay.”
He also had an issue on the night of 24 August with what may have been an unlit ship that did not show up on AIS. “My Echomax alarm was going off but there was nothing visible, and my chart-plotter was not showing any targets on the AIS overlay. The Echomax was indicating they were pretty close. I kept a very good watch after that! It was a clear, moonless night, and I didn’t see a single light.”
He was lucky that the unlit vessel, if that is what it was, at least had radar. It is well-known that some vessels in this area operate without aids to navigation, including running lights. They flick torches at oncoming vessels when they hear their motors, or so it is said by Darwin sailors who frequent this area. Bad luck for the electric outboard crowd, even if they were running their engines!
Having taken a dislike to sardines after eating half of the world’s supply en route to Fiji (just kidding – though he says that now he can’t stand looking at an unopened tin), on this passage Adam was eating a wide variety of foodstuffs and enjoying meals much more. He still had some fresh stuff, such as eggs, tomatoes, avocados, and fruit, which made all the difference, whether for breakfast, or an omelette at lunch.
He has plenty of tinned fish and meats, such as tuna, mackerel, corned mutton, corned beef, spam, and a series of mixed tins of kids’ sausages and spaghetti, etc. If it’s too rough to prepare proper meals, he’ll just have a couple of apples, or maybe resort to dried noodles to get him through the next few hours. “But generally speaking, we’ve spent a long time on these boats now, you sort of get to know how you can feed yourself in difficult conditions.”
With LITTLE WREN now halfway around the world and on the homeward stretch, Adam is delighted that his voyage has so far raised £30,000 for the Ella Dawson Foundation, a charity that supports young people living with cancer. He still hopes to achieve his target of £100,000 for the circumnavigation.
On 26 August, Eric appeared to be running in 9th position, though the leaderboard has been unreliable for some days, due to the Darwin waypoint corrupting data. Eric is still smarting from his decision to peel off to the NW when approaching the Great Barrier Reefs and enter through Bligh Entrance rather than Raine Island. That decision cost him around 70 miles, plus he had to sail to windward all the way down the Great North East Channel. Luckily, he was able to do so on one tack, apart from a quick board to windward, to clear a reef near the inboard end.
On the morning of the 25th he was drifting along with around 4 knots of wind, unsure of which way to go. He had intended to push on west and work his way through the calms, but the currents had been playing havoc with his course, setting him north during the night, though often reversing in daylight hours. He said the sailing had been “really good” since leaving Thursday Island, with a great breeze, up until the last 24 hours. He averaged about 120 miles a day over the first 6 days, but since the wind eased off in the previous 24 hours, only did about 73. Eric may be 72-years old, but this veteran ocean racing sailor still relishes a physical challenge.
Despite his disappointment at no longer being in a competitive position, he was still enjoying the race and treating it as a grand adventure. He had just caught a large tuna and enjoyed a feast of fresh fish. Not having a means of frying it (he only has a Jetboil stove with a small pot to boil water for his dehydrated meals and drinks), let alone baking, he ate as much of it as he could raw. He has come to the conclusion that he won’t catch another one too much of it goes to waste. He had also eaten most of the fresh food he bought at Thursday Island, including his last egg, which he boiled for breakfast that day.
He remains very impressed with the Hydrovane self-steering unit he fitted in Fiji, which has steered the boat through all the different weather conditions encountered since leaving Vuda Marina. It even steered the boat throughout the previous night, as SUNBEAR ghosted along in 3-4 knots of wind under A3 all night.
He admitted that he was feeling a bit flat, emotionally, as a consequence of his poor decision-making, first, in going north when approaching Queensland when the others continued west to Raine Island, and then NOT going north on this stage, instead watching Keri, Renaud, Dan and Adam romp away on the fresher winds and strong favourable currents.
But he is trying to be philosophical, reading books and playing his harmonica to entertain himself when he is not ‘crunching numbers’ to improve performance, something he does a lot more now that he no longer spends most of his day helming SUNBEAR. He also moves his weight around until he finds the optimum trim to make the boat go a fraction faster. As an old ocean racer, he knows that it is all about the numbers. Ease the mainsheet and go 0.2 of a knot faster… reef or unreef the headsail… attention to detail is the name of the game. That, and going the right way!
Jasmine has been having a challenging time as well, as her mum, Susan, reported. “Jasmine had a horrendous day last Thursday. It was squally and overcast all day, and miserable on deck. As another squall hit, she furled her A3 and it just ripped. Not just a little tear; it’s shredded and is likely to be irreparable.
“Jasmine bought a new set of sails for NUMBATOU just before setting off from Portugal in December but kept a spare A3. It’s an old one, and it really is just an emergency spare- not intended to take her another half globe. She dragged it out and eventually got it up, but it then slid down the furling line into the water. She then had to retrieve it from under the boat, and sort it over the course of 2 hours, all the while under bare poles.
She’s also really glad that the 1.5m-long yellow and black sea snake she spotted today wasn’t around when she was retrieving her sail! She struggled to hold her course that day, and had a close encounter with a very big boat. She was tired, frustrated and miserable. This really brings home how isolated you can be as a solo sailor; you have to constantly problem-solve, and it’s hard mentally and physically!
“So, she could really do with a new sail! The challenge is, these are class sails made to order, they are expensive, and the first feasible place to get one to is Mauritius. Taking another sail on board incurs a 48-hour time penalty, too, but it’s more important to have a full set of functioning sails.”
Nonetheless, Jasmine continues to hold her own in the rear pack of the fleet, sitting in 8th position, and is showing no sign of slowing down. After beginning the MGR with minimal experience, she has evolved over the last 8 months into a serious competitor.
Christian had a pleasant 8-10 knot SE breeze on the morning of 25 August, with smooth seas, and he was enjoying the sail. His course has been a bit uneven over the previous few days (though if often has been throughout the MGR). He said this was partially due to random but strong currents that set him all over the place, especially when almost becalmed, as he had been the night before, but admitted that sometimes it was because ARGO sailed better under windvane in a certain direction, or the wind changed while he slept and he did not notice for a while, enjoying the sail and forgetting to check the compass!
The night before, he had been sailing under A5 and A3 set wing and wing, with a reefed mainsail, but a change in wind direction carried him off course while he slept. He was now broad-reaching, with the full main, jib and A3 flying to starboard, the breeze was around 110-120° off the bow, that is, slightly aft of the port beam, and ARGO was making 4-5 knots to the west.
It made a pleasant change from the rough start to this stage. Christian said, “The sea was coming from all sides at the same time. It was really bumpy inside the boat. We got thrown around quite a lot. Water was entering, or attempting to enter, the cockpit from every side. It was really wet for a couple of days, with spray coming over all. I somehow managed to get through that without getting the boat too wet inside.”
Despite the rough weather, he managed to get enough rest. “I have a couple of 30-minute naps during the day, and at night I sleep. My alarm clock is set for every 30 minutes. Last night I slept about six and a half hours, also in patterns of 30 minutes each. I just take a look around, and check the AIS occasionally, but the last few nights I didn’t see any other ships.
“A few nights ago, though, it was quite scary because there was a big ship coming up right behind me. I could see both its starboard and port running lights, and two steaming lights close together. It was obviously going to be a close one, and I changed course immediately. I woke up because my Echomax (active radar reflector) alarm woke me. And then the other pilot changed course too. I think he was so late changing course because Josh and I were pretty close, and he wanted to pass between us. And then I switched the AIS on because I wanted to call him, and I lit up all my lights. I’ve got a big floodlight in the cockpit, which really illuminates the sails too.”
ARGO is well provisioned for the long haul to Mauritius, and left Thursday Island with over 200L of water, as Christian was not sure what the supply at Cocos-Keeling Atoll would be like. He said that the boat was in excellent condition apart from the sails, which are getting a bit tired, especially his two A5s, both of which are having trouble with leach lines chafing through their pockets. He has been doing a bit of hand-stitching. Although there might be several contributing factors, UV damage from keeping the A7 and A5 permanently hoisted seems to be taking its toll on this circumnavigation race.
Christian relies heavily on his A5 sails. He does have an A7, but unlike Jasmine, has never worked out how to get the best from that sail. He noted that when NUMBATOU and ARGO were sailing neck and neck inside the Great Barrier Reefs, the wind freshened and they had to strike their A5s and set A7s in their place. He surmised that perhaps he should have reduced his mainsail from two to three reefs, allowing his A7 to catch more of the wind, but for whatever reason his A7 was not drawing well, and NUMBATOU got away from ARGO.
By the afternoon of 28 August, after making a decisive course alteration to the north, ARGO had sneaked back into 7th position, but Chriatian reported that he was unable to charge his batteries and had yet to discover the cause. Oh well, if John Guzzwell could do it…
QUESTION 2 was about 30 miles from Cape Don late in the afternoon on 25 August, and Gary hoped to arrive in Darwin sometime the following day, but was still sitting in the same place, almost becalmed, the following morning, underlining the challenge of sailing into this place without long-range auxiliary power.
He’d hoped to arrive off the Cape in time to ride the flood tide in late on the 25th. For Gary, this is the end of his MGR adventure, but it has given him a taste for long-distance sailing. He hopes to do more of it in the future, maybe even a circumnavigation, but with Brenda, or friends, rather than alone. A voyage like this, despite frustrations and anxieties, both of which Gary freely admits to experiencing, is transformative. He will never be the same.
Like the others, he was bashed around a bit during the first 4 days, and says there is no way he’d cruise these waters for fun! “You’d be going along in one direction, with the swell sort of on the quarter, and then all of a sudden one would come beam on and crash over the boat, making it round up. There was a short, steep, five-second period between the waves.”
He had not seen a lot of shipping until the last day, when a large research vessel called OCEAN SHIELD, operated by the Australian Border Force, stopped near him while it transferred gear from another, smaller vessel. Coastwatch planes had also been flying overhead daily. They always asked where he was going, to which he replied, “Darwin.” The last time they visited, they asked, “So you are not going to Cocos with the others, then?” Trick question! Sadly, the answer is no, and the MGR will be poorer for it.
