Well our spirits have been lifted today by an unexpected fantastic day of sailing, we are steaming along at 6-9 knots with flat sparkling seas and sunshine and the tub is filled with cold sea water keeping us cool.

We decided to bite the bullet early this morning and put up the cruising chute - just the two of us - as it was such light winds.

It could have gone either way - overtake the fleet or get divorced at sea !

It went up first time perfectly and we have been romping along overtaking boats ever since looking very beautiful with our huge colourful sail flying.

The sail has been stored on deck so it gets wet when it rains and the red colour has seeped onto the yellow and turquoise parts giving it a distinctive tie dye effect, but hey we could have paid a lot of money for that unique design !

The twistle is out of action as we are waiting for a part that Adam is bringing out to Bali to fix the main drum, although the light winds would probably have meant lots of flapping about even with the twistle.

Just got to get the bloody thing down now !!!