Position 29:30.3N 015:05.6W

Mariposa Blanca Move
Skip- Andy Petty. Owner hard at work in office!
Tue 15 Jan 2013 14:04
Hi all,

Tuesday 1305UT
Log 2571
Distance to run 120nm
ETA Wed 1030 UT

Last night, after the previous, is maybe best described as the " long and winding road". With little change to conditions except an increase in sea state and gusts to 36 knots, it was a further rather sleepless night. Dawn brought a clear sky and now we can feel some genuine warmth in the sun's rays (sorry to all the folk suffering extreme cold in various parts of the world right now but in fairness, your keyboards are more likely to be stationary). An eventual drop in the wind to around 24 knots has allowed us to increase sail area and we are bouncing down these seas at a steady 7 knots or so.

The autopilot is working exceptionally well and as I am not usually so kind to this particular brand of boat electronics, I think I must congratulate the installer! The rest of the same make electronics have lights that do not dim enough (by design) and others that spontaneously switch themselves of. However, thank you to JNIC for kindly loaning us the wind wand from your masthead because we have good wind info and this is controlling the autopilot direction.
SOLAR panels are really starting to come good but for a reason as yet to be determined, the engine charging system and monitoring unit showed us to have a fault this morning. The battery meter suddenly showed us to be on empty and charge rate was just 20 amps. Givent the difficulty of finding the multimeter in these conditions, further investiagtion is delayed until tomorrow in Tenerife although once we stopped the engine, the capacity magically began recovering to 80% and I suspect/hope a factory reset of the system will resolve as it was all working really well until this morning.

Just heard Tenerife traffic coastradion clearly on VHF at a range of 74nm so it seems we are heading in the right direction. Hardly any other traffic still yet.

A cold beer calls me from the cockpit so blog must be completed before this mutinous crew consume my share. They do however send thanks to all messages of support.

For Jan - hope the dogs are recovered from their excesseses for now and no doubt ready for more soon!!

Finally, I have been reminded I failed yesterday to tell you the tale of the fork. The cutlery on the yacht has green plastic handles by the way.
On Sunday evening, Mike passed up eating irons to the cockpit just in advance of food being served as sunset was underway. By now the wind was already gaining in strength and seas were somewhat boistrous. As Mike handed the knives and forks to Ade, one fork made a bid for freedom during a big lurch of the boat and disappeared, presumed drowned and subsequently mourned as a sad casualty of the sea. Fortunately we have more onboard. Little more was thought of the matter (it was only fork) until lunchtime yesterday when during even more boistorous seas, Ade suddenely noted a green flash of something nestling inside the blue spare genoa sheets which are neatly coiled and hung safely over the after upper guardrail ready for instant use. Lo and behold - he reached over and there was the missing fork! Amazing that it never went overboard in the first place and managed to hit the coil of rope: even more amazing that it somehow became entangled and held by the rope: uttery incredible that it should stay there for around 20 hrs of pretty heavy weather with the rope coil swinging quite wildy around the guardrail. And totally unbelievable that the crew were sober enough to recover it without dropping into the sea afterall (only joking!!).

Actully alcohol consumption is low and food intake high, given the rotten conditions, I give all credit and many thanks to the team for their very valiant efforts. I will thank them by providing a big english breakfast tomorrow - ashore in the Pink Parrot cafe in Las Galletas. Ade says he only came to lose weight - oh dear!

I am pleased to report that Peter actually likes the yellow cruising shute colour but can I add a picture to the blog? This I will try hard to do but the process invovles taking the photo, transferring it to the laptop, resizing it for iridium email transmission and finally attaching it to the blog. The little problem is the transfer to the laptop and when I find the cable to do it (I know its onboard somewhere) I will, I promise.

Thanks to everyone for reading.

We are taking care, so please must all of you, wherever you are.

NB Julian and Jan have hit Dubai and all Australia heaves a sigh of relief!! Seriously, good luck to you both and look forwrad to hearing more.

All the best from the brusied but happy

Mariposa Blanca delivery team.