Rain Catchment 2.0 and a New Year’s Chat with the Wife
January 1, 2018
Day 89
Noon Position: 46 45S 31 41E
Course(t)/Speed(kts): E 5
Wind(t/tws): NW 10 (within five minutes, WSW 25)
Sea(t/ft): NW 6
Sky: Rain, turning to squally but dry
10ths Cloud Cover: 10
Bar(mb): 997+, rising
Cabin Temp(f): 54
Water Temp(f): 46
Relative Humidity(%): 86
Sail: Working jib and main sail full
Noon-to-Noon Miles Made Good (nm): 151
Miles since departure: 12,172
Avg. Miles/Day: 137
Days since Cape Horn: 32
Miles since Cape Horn: 4,527
Avg. Miles/Day: 141
Longitude Degrees-Made-Good (degrees minutes): 3 40
Longitude Miles-Made-Good (at Lat 47S): 150
Total Longitude-Made-Good Since Cape Horn (degrees minutes): 98 58
New Year’s Day.
I woke to drizzle and thought the responsible thing to do was catch some of it. Winds were light (NW 18) and seas were down enough that they stayed off the deck. The night had see NW 30 – 40, so the workable sea state surprised me.
I guzzled a cup of coffee, got into foulies, raised the main and rigged my catchment system on the main’s cradle cover. Within three hours I had ten gallons of cool, crisp drinking water in the tank. That’s ten days at normal ration.
Capture started slow at first, due largely to my drizzle being mostly fog. But even fog blown against the sail filled the two gallon container in twenty minutes. When fog coupled with a light rain, it took less than ten.
Lesson: a) rain capture using the cradle cover is more successful in something less than a full gale; b) main at full is the most efficient (see a).
At the tail end of the morning, I experimented with the method previous owner, Tony Gooch, used, which was to build a dam of putty around the water intakes in order to capture deck water as it runs down the scuppers. This is a *much* simpler approach if the sea is down and the deck is salt free (it had been drizzling for hours, so it was). The single disadvantage is that it’s impossible to gauge how much one is taking in. Well, that, and it requires a quantity of putty, which I was barely able to scrape together. Putty wasn’t on the pre-departure list.
Somewhere in the middle there, I was able to break-off for a phone call with my wife, Joanna. We’ve only spoken twice since I departed. Once was Christmas day, and she was so surrounded by family I could barely get in a word. Today, just us two. For her it was midnight. She’d just watched the ball drop in Time Square. Nice way to begin the year for both of us. 
Rain dried up by noon and wind went abruptly into the SW at 25. The sky looks menacing and wet. So far it is neither.
I have a Ranger 32 a Gary Mull design. He put a drain with a built up scupper on the deck on both sides. It drains through the inside. I always figured that was the purpose to gather rain water. Stay safe.
Randall, our water catchment system is much like Tony’s but no need for the putty. The dam to catch the water and send it down the water fill cap is merely a dish towel rolled up and placed along the forward edge of the toe rail and wrapped around the aft side of the water fill cap. The fresh water, if decks are clear of salt water, runs down along the the toe rail and hits the rolled up towel that is wrapped around the aft end of the deck fill, and voila, all the water goes into the tanks. We used it on our circumnavigation and while cruising on KANDARIK and it worked like a charm… I will send Jo a photo and perhaps she can send it to you! Love your logs and love your photos, and love it that you give all of us following you these wonderful glimpses into your adventures. Thank you, Pam
I also just chuck a wet dish towel down to use as my dam in the scuppers. If it’s raining hard, the 90 gallon tanks fill surprisingly quickly and then overflow into the bilges!
The picture of you talking is precious! You look so happy!