Underway again - Position noon 12th January 12 45.81N 070 18.98W

Aurora_b
Mike and Liz Downing
Tue 12 Jan 2010 17:44
Departed Bonaire at 18.00 yesterday, bound for Panama, either the San Blas islands or the canal zone depending on the weather. Had planned to leave today, but the forecast changed quite considerably yesterday, so it was an early departure to get as far west as we can before the weather changes. We can only get Grib files when at sea and they tend to be a bit too optimistic. The seas were a bit confused leaving Bonaire and we had to be beam on for a couple of hours which was uncomfortable, but since then we have been running downwind with the wind just on our starboard quarter. The outer genoa is poled out to windward and the inner is sheeted normally. With these up we are doing about 7kts through the water, but 9kts over the ground - there's quite a current. Wind is 15 to 20kts and the seas are around 6ft to 8ft. So, so far so good. Started taking our malaria tablets today required in case we do get to the San Blas islands. Hope they don't react with my seasickness patches! Just called up a tanker on a collision course - CPA 0.1M - and we both changed course to starboard to pass port to port. At the moment there are quite a few ships going to or from the ABCs.