First Voyage

Stephen Flesch       August 12, 2021

I am Stephen Flesch and signed on as Bosun and watchkeeper for Stormvogel\'s first voyage from Cape Town to the UK. I was involved from the beginning. When the hull arrived at the docks from Stellenbosch we had to lift it up and drop it onto the keel and thankfully all the keelbolts fitted. Then came the job of rigging. The mast and standing rigging was delivered from the UK with everything clearly labelled. There was a bit of head scratching when the forestay was too long until reference to the sailplan specified a mast rake aft of five degrees. Then everything fitted perfectly. A few days after launching we set sail for England. Only five of the crew had any ocean sailing experience and the rest were novices but by the time we got to Europe they had been licked into shape. After a week\'s refit at Zaandam we did a couple of offshore races, then Cowes week and the Fastnet in which we took line honours. In the picture off Cowes under spinnaker that is me on the bow wearing a beret