Day 8 Monday

Alcedo
David Batten
Mon 2 Dec 2013 19:56
Position 17 57.78 N. 33 38.0 W

After a lovely sunset last night we actually sailed through out the night and were gradually freed until we could sail directly towards St Lucia. There was much discussion as to whether the morning would increase the wind or cause it to die completely. In fact it died so we started charging With the engine in gear until we gave in and admitted that we were motoring. So far today we have had an engine on for 8 hours and it looks as if it will be running all night.

Overnight we had lights to the north and at dawn saw the sails of another yacht. We slowly pulled away from them but never saw an AIS signal so don't know who they were. The ocean is so vast that we have our piece to our selves.

The Grib files show an area of about 1000 miles east to west and 600 North to south with less than 5 kts of wind. As most of the fleet will be in this area they will all be making the motor or no motor decision. At present the wind is about 5 kts from the NW so nothing like enough for us to sail.

I am very glad that we have lots of diesel but even with 1200 litres we can't motor all the way. So far we have used about 260.

Today's jobs included trying to get the water maker to work. Unfortunately the low pressure pump need priming and once running the inverter / generator combination which is need to run it decided to shut down as it got too hot. Will try again in the morning.

The days revolve around food and each chef of the day is using up ingredients before they get condemned so we are having a whole series of gourmet meals.

As it is so calm we ran the washing machine, swept up and had a second day of boat airing. All is now sweet smelling and pure.

The afternoon entertainment was a trivial quiz. The success rate was very low as the questions were obscure in the extreme.

Goodnight from Alcedo.

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