wind and rain
Gudrun V
Axel Busch
Mon 16 Apr 2012 18:11
Everything fine on board of Gudrun! Liz is lying in the cockpit, repeating French phrases from her iPod language class, and I just finished catching up on the sleep I missed last night during my watch. Changing winds and lots of rain kept me busy from 11pm until 6am this morning, when Liz took over again.
Yes, there is Wind! And quite a lot of it too, we even had to put in a reef last night. It's not very steady though, varying between 4kn and 20kn of strength and changing from SE to SW as we make our way from raincloud to raincloud. I've long stopped adjusting sails to the wind in these conditions, especially at night. It takes too much energy, and any change is good for only a few minutes at best. Instead we simply adjust the course to 50 degrees AWA (apparent wind angle), which means we wriggle our way south-westerly-ish. Sometimes more south, sometimes more west, at times a little north. Beggars can't be choosers. The idea is to get between 4 and 6 degrees south rather quickly, because the trade winds should blow more steadily there. Then we turn west, put the parasailor up, and take it down three weeks later when we arrive in Hiva Oa. One can dream ....
Liz asked what she's going to do with herself for three weeks on the boat with only me as company. No Cafes, no internet, and not much chance to write on her book because she gets seasick when looking at the screen. "Learn French!" I said, and that's what she's doing. And I will too ... Je peux laisser mon dinghy ici? Je voudrais verifier l'alternateur. Stuff like that :-)
A demain