Blue Wonder - Sunday 28th November
Rapier 550 on tour
Mark Jarvis
Mon 29 Nov 2021 17:20
The wind forecast for today was pretty much as expected
and so we kept up the parasail over night and gained around 80 miles
in 24 hours on most of our direct competitors. The combination of
the fast hulls, aft dart keels and forward helm allowed us to be confident
and secure when sailing fast with the big sail.
However, the wind is always the master and the
latest forecast shows that the Easterly trade winds we have been
waiting for are about to arrive and with a bit more strength than we
were hoping - the decision to swap the parasail for the jib was made just in
time and the deck crew worked hard to get the sail down, packed and stored in
the spinnaker locker before the real wind began.
The wind continued to grow and with it came big
following seas - however, this meant we could again track directly down the
course to St Lucia and our VMG was still pretty good.
The overnight watch keeping routine is now well
established and easy with each of us taking 2 hour shift at the helm. With
little to see or be concerned about and the most comfortable watch keeping
position possible then our stints pass quickly and we can go back to bed.
Even though the wind increased and the sea state continued to make surfing
inevitable, the boat was able to easily keep things under control on autopilot
without the need for any manual intervention.
Mark |