" A Lady trip" the A.R.C. Las Palmas to St Lucia Avoiding the recession in style

A Lady
Stephen Hyde
Sun 6 Dec 2009 10:23
DAY 13
Saturday 5th December 2009
 
00.00A good steady E breeze, 18 / 20 knots and we are averaging 8knots
 
02.00  Almost a full moon lighting up the sky and all is well,that is except for the flying fish that flew into the cockpit, however as we saw him land,
we put him back to the sea, he was one of the lucky ones
 
004.00 Checked the Oyster / Mastervolt theory on the generator
 
06.00  The skipper, Dermot and Mark were up and about,  Mark was in the middle of making tea when the boat was lifted clean up and sideways
          on a huge wave, poor Mark went flying across the saloon and hit the chart table, severly bruising his foot.
          After a few hours of frozen prawns on his foot, plus the appropriate amount of drugs, he began to feel human again.
 
08.00 The GUY snapped again in 26 knots of wind.DAMN  Damn,
         The MIGHTY crew took down the KITE in double quick time and we decided to goose wing for a while,
 ( the boat rolls \much more sailing in this fashion ).
      
08.30 We decided to gybe as we were going too far south, BANG  the shackle holding the main sheet block to the boom exploded and the boom shot out and whammed into the shrouds,    Ohhhhh GOD surely the boom is burst !    Phew , no its not , not even damaged, we were lucky ......
 09.00 Wind now at 28 knots
 
12.00  Skipper landed a lovely Tuna ( approx 8 lbs ) while MARK , the injured fisherman was  crashed out in the bunk.
 14.00 Wind had eased off by now so we put up the KITE again and off we went  on a STB pole.
 
18.00 Wind now back to a steady 20 knots, Just bleedin lovely, so out come the " CORK DRY GIN " and of course Sweepes tonic's
         to celebrate our good progress, however we did slip milage against the fleet over the last 24 hours.
         WE  then sighted another competitor, The russions in their 62 foot yacht, spoke to them on V.H.F,
 
20.00  Dermot cooked the freshly caught TUNA for dinner,, plus a few wines,, YUM, YUM
 
22.00 we watched more RUGBY on the T.V. and comisorrated the MUNSTER loss against Osprey's ..
 
24.00 We are sailing along nicely at 8 /9 knots girectly towards our waypoint between Martinique and St.Lucia
 
 
DAY 14
Sunday 6th December 2009
 
06.oo We had a great steady 20 / 23 knot breeze all night,
         Almost full moon and gazillions of stars , Better than at home, where the weather is still miserable.
         A Ship passed going south,
 06.30 We made contact with AKARANA again and were delighted with our selves, we definatly took 20 miles out of them,, 
   
          WE  ARE NOW ONLY 182 N MILES to the finish
 
Talk to you later
Stephen Hyde      Skipper.