After a month and a half in Trinidad, we finally made the move to head north. (Check out some of what we’ve been up to in Trinidad here). The journey was to be a 380nm sail to Antigua taking EITHER 3 days (Khiara’s guess) or 2.5 (Adam’s guess). Millie, ultimately has the deciding vote!

In the first 4 hours however the passage derailed, badly. When the bilge pump alarm beeped. Then beeped again. And continued beeping until we got very concerned. We emptied the water using our manual bilge pump as the automatic bilge pump obviously wasn’t keeping up. Within 10 seconds of emptying it, the alarm sounded again and this continued on for a few minutes while Adam tore up floorboards and cupboards searching for a leak in the boat.

Seeing no obvious leaks, Adam observed what was happening in the bilge and decided to close the automatic bilge pump sea cock. With me still pumping the water out using the manual pump, the water started to drain and not come back. After some deducing, we think the auto pump was pushing water into the bilge rather than taking it out. Either as a result of the bilge pump not having a check valve or the anti siphon being blocked and causing a vacuum of sorts for the water.

We were minutes away from doing the recommended practice if you’re taking on water, of tacking. The theory being that if water is coming in on the tack you’re currently on, you may be able to limit the water intake by lifting the side of the boat out of the water on the other tack.

Thankfully, after that stressful experience we continued further. Although we had some minor boat breakages on the journey, nothing as full on as those first few hours underway!

Please enjoy today’s episode of our sail to Antigua taking in total – 2.4 days!