Day 7 - Jibe and back on rhumb line for Virgin Gorda

Blue Note
Marco M.
Tue 23 Dec 2014 14:26
Date: Tuesday 12/23/14 - Time:  13:17 UTC
Position 11:51.379N  40:44.288W
COG 293M SOG 6.0kt, Wind 78T 16 kt,
Temperatures: Air 27.8C, Sea 24.1C
Last 24h Sailed Distance: 135 NM
Last 24h Decrease Distance on rhumb line: 100 NM
Sailed distance since departure: 1025.30 NM
Time since departure: 7d 0h 27m
Average Speed since departure: 6.02      kt
Average VMG since departure:   4.90  kt
Intention: sail to Virgin Gorda
Distance to End on rhumb line: 1424 NM
ETA: Friday January 2, 2015

Detailed Track (50 is the maximum number of point, i.e. once the last point reaches 50, the last point always is 50):
http://share.findmespot.com/shared/faces/viewspots.jsp?glId=0EIVGO9oiEYLjqAfRxhderm34cEEF9dMP

We are south enough to avoid the center of the high pressure and the area of calm winds. Therefore this morning at 9 am local time we jibe and now on a coarse much closer to the rhumb line (course 299M) . The weather routing program (Bluewater racing) still recommends to be a bit lower of the rhumb line (course 294M)  for a better speed.

The problem of the solenoid of the starter was finally (we hope) solved by replacing the spade connector of the wire going from the key to the solenoid.
Since we did this, the engine has always cranked at the first key stroke.

The tuna lure so far have catched a lot of Sargasso weeds and a strange sea monster (see photo below).
If we don't get our desired tuna by 2pm we will switch back to the well proven Mahi-Mahi lure.


strategy

Grib file of wind speed. By having kept a south course we avoided the area of calm that is along the CapeVerde-BVI rhumb line.

Candice Letter

Launch of the wish bottle for Candice (Dec 22 Lat: 12:14.46N Lon: 38:29.11W)

sea monster