Day 5 - 27 27.05S 178 30.70E

Aurora_b
Mike and Liz Downing
Thu 4 Nov 2010 02:27
The wind strength continually reduced overnight and this morning. We started with 2 reefs in the main and a partly rolled inner genoa and now have full main and full outer genoa up (having taken reefs out at midnight!). Our target has been to maintain 5 to 5.5kts until sufficiently far south to go below the forecast low that's going to come across the Coral Sea from north Australia on Saturday. That's likely to bring high winds. The weather system is quite complex at the moment, but the forecast period of light winds has started, so we expect to be motor sailing to keep our speed up until below 30S (about 150 miles away). With full main and outer genoa up we had a magical sail this morning, ghosting along at 5-6kts with 9kts of wind just ahead of the beam. The skies were clear so we had sun for the first time for a while. The sea was a deep blue with a gentle swell and just a small amount of wind chop on top. It would be so nice to have this for the next 4 days, but that won't happen! Had a 9 inch flying fish on deck this morning - it's the first time that's happened since our crossing from Galapagos.

With the lighter winds our noon-to-noon run was only 131 miles. We now have less than 500 miles to go, but with the mixed weather forecast it's not going to be dull! We've been on passage for 5 days and haven't seen any sign of human life - no boats or planes, nothing. We do take part in the SSB net, so we know there are other people still on the planet!

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