Sailing with Antara

Team Antara at Captain of Ports jetty A ntara made her way towards the seas on May 10, 2019, and it’s been a rollercoaster ride ever since.   Week 1 We motored her to the Captain of Ports jetty and put up her mast with the help of a crane and a dozen helping hands. Antara sailed to Dona Paula the next day. It was a bit tricky putting up the genoa near the casino boats on the Mandovi river, even with Chatty helming and Dilip and I managing the sail. The Genoa is two thirds the length of the boat and tends to get stuck in the stays. Eventually we made our way around the headland and into the Zuari river. Where we inadvertently rubbed noses with a submerged wreck! A dive late in the week showed no damage, so that was that. Office space As she was to be anchored offshore, our first task was to put in a sinker to which we could moor Antara. It took us, newbies, the better part of the afternoon to figure how to place the sinker, tie the anchor cables and float the marker.

Ready for inspection Tonnage Computation Sale deed Builders Certificate Allotment of Name, official number, call sign and MMSI Declaration of Ownership - Form 3 Passport copy Carving & Marking Note Watchkeeping certificate Drawings of the vessel Particulars of ship Certificate of Survey Certificate of class Owner undertaking to maintain class Owner undertaking of application as a commercial vessel Details of Life-saving, fire fighting, navigation & communication equipment Incline Test  Stability booklet That's the list of documents required to register a sailboat for commercial purposes, with the Director General of Shipping in India! We've spent a nerve-racking two weeks in the throes of the final registration process ensuring that Antara has all the mandated equipment, marked with her name, port of registry and official number. And this afternoon, finally, we have sign off on documents that assure us that our boat will be registered and

Antara, her Skipper and I, are all set. We're ready to go but have to stew in the sun till the paperwork is complete.  We've kept ourselves busy though. Mooring anchor The mooring anchor has been designed and is awaiting despatch to the depths of Dona Paula, where we plan to anchor. A large rubber tyre was filled with cement, with a semi circular metal rod placed in the middle as a handle. It weighs over 20kgs and we will probably take it along with us when we make the first and final crossing out of Divar to the seas.  Anchor cable Antara's mast is taller than most of t he bridges across the rivers Mandovi and Zuari. To take Antara to sea, we will have to take down her mast and motor her to the moorings and rejig the mast for the final time.   Antara gets her glasses 40 metres of anchor cable have been cleaned, painted green, and marked at every 10 metres: one white loop for every 10 metres. It's been looped through the windlass and sits snu

Ribander-Divar Ferry That's what Roy, my Skipper in the Clipper Race , called our 70 footer. And it seems an apt title for the various sailing vessels I have been watching on the River Mhadei since we started prepping Antara . River Ferry The first of the boaties we have the pleasure of meeting every morning is our ferry across to Divar . These are the sole public transport option across to the island.  We can either hop on to the one that leaves from Ribander or the one from Old Goa. The former costs an arm and a leg, at 10 rupees a ride! The latter is a princely sum of 7 rupees. And that's for 4-wheelers. 2-wheelers and walk on passengers ride free. So far Divar residents have resisted building a bridge across and even the trains that run across, do not have a stop on the island.  Fishing Trawler Trawler As we drive to Divar, from Panaji, we see a lot of fishing villages dotting the riverbanks. And whole droves of fishing boats that lol about all day after a lo

Lat Long for  Antara at Aquarius Shipyard The navigation equipment finally arrived. All the boxes were opened and the items checked to confirm that we had indeed received all the parts. What we had ordered was a multi function display (MFD), wind instruments, radar and a satellite communication system, as mandated for a Category 1 vessel (where we will be able to sail her anywhere in the world). Then we had to finalise where to locate all the equipment, on the boat. We have to ensure we make the best use of the available space, keeping in mind that there is limited space; that being a boat not all her 'walls' are flat, or straight; that she will spend all her time in water, which can be, well, wet! The wiring was already in place and had been placed such that it was hidden from view yet easily accessible should something go wrong. The switches and electrical boxes are all placed to port, next to the galley. The navigation table was made so that a nav chart could be e

Aquarius Shipyard  is India's leading sail boat builder. The team here, led by Ratnakar Dandekar has the distinction of building both the sail boats that helped 8 Indian Naval offices circumnavigate the world. First, Capt Dilip Donde who is the first Indian to sail solo around the world. He then mentored Cdr Tomy who sailed solo and no-stop around the world. Both of them sailed on INSV Mhadei . More recently, Dilip trained the Navika Sagar Parikrama team, which sailed on INSV Tarini . Around the same time, the Aquarius team built SV Thuriya, which Tomy sailed for the Golden Globe Race 2018-19 Antara has august predecessors and we're proud of her lineage.  Working on Antara, we spend quality time with a few good men. Yash, on the right Security and hard hat men The man-child in the security cabin,at the gate, Yash. He looks like a newly hatched adult not quite sure if he has indeed grown up. His 'make up' scowl; to scare the world into believing he's

Incline Test Now that Antara is in the water, it's difficult to imagine her as ever having been out of it! She's as snug as bug in a rug now that she is afloat in her medium.  Checklists The first thing on our checklist now was a survey by the Director General of Shipping . The Goa representative came down to the yard and after a good look at the boat, advised us on the ext steps. So more surveys and documents coming up in the near future before we can start sailing. An interesting check and a first for me, was an incline experiment . It's done in order to check her stability; including the angle of vanishing stability or just how far the boat will roll and right herself. Most people panic at a incline greater than 10 degrees. Good thing I didn't know that when I sailed across the South Atlantic , when the average incline on our boat was 45 degrees! The test involves putting equal amounts of weight in places, two aft and two forward, symmetrical to the mas

Even as we continued working on Antara , we decided to make a trip along the West Coast, covering Maharashtra  and Goa. The idea was to get a fix on the kind of jetties and shore options available today. We set off early on a Sunday morning, with the intention of reaching Ratnagiri that evening.  Devgad Our first stop was Devgad. After getting on to State Highway 4, we made our way through small hamlets, up and down some beautiful hillsides. Cruising over a crest, the sea unfurled towards the horizon, in shades of blue. Driving along the coastline, I was delighted to have found our very own Route 1. Devgad is a fishing village located in the middle of two coves. The cove on the left is a pristine, clean strip of beach, seemingly undiscovered by the tourist and the cove on the right plays host to a multitude of fishing boats. The only road in the village curls around the fishing harbour and ends in a surprisingly well maintained jetty. The channel is marked and water seems de

First test rig Some of you had trouble figuring the boatese. Have a look at this diagram on Pinterest to help you with names of different parts of the boat. Meanwhile. one of the first things we did on getting Antara out of the shed, was to put up her mast  and boom. They can't stay up on their own, so the forestay and the backstay were put up too. That's when we realised that the forestay was a little short. With a sailboat such things are expected and I'm learning to not expect a perfect fit the first time.  Tied up in knots We used one of the halyards then and moved on to the other ropes. We started with the mainsail sheets. These will help move the mainsail from side to side and will be controlled from the cockpit. As we laid out the rope, we had to keep in mind the rope width (12mm), the fittings required and the appropriate length such that it would be long enough for a boom stretched out on a broad reach. Then we set up the furler line and the foresail sh