Position           10:33.48 S 147:19.30 E                              

Date                1200 (UTC+11) Friday 09 October 2015

Distance run    in 24hrs 157nm over the ground, 161nm through the water

Trip total         1311nm over the ground, 1283nm through the water

To go to           Kupang Indonesia 1496nm

Uneventful is good.  We continue on our eighth day and the seventh of running in decent strength trade winds.  We are sure that this is the mostly consistent sailing that we have encountered since leaving Las Palmas in 2010.  It will not last for ever but if it gets us through the Torres Straits it would be very useful.

A couple of days ago I said that I would give the Remoska a plug.  Supplied by Lakeland Plastics, an unlikely named UK supplier of kitchen ware, tools and consumables it had its origins in post Second World War Czechoslovakia.  It consists of a lightweight round pan, we have two different depths, and a heavy lid containing a 640 watt heating element.  The low power consumption makes it well suited for using in conjunction with the inverter when we have spare battery capacity as well of course with the generator.  The Mate regularly uses it for all sorts of tasks from roasting chickens, baking cakes, cooking potatoes and other tasks that would otherwise require the gas oven.  Every cruising boat that has an inverter and/or a generator should have one.  Used in conjunction with an induction hotplate it has meant that the reduction in our gas consumption has been very noticeable.  We cannot use the hotplate at sea unfortunately as there is no means of keeping pans secure as the boat moves. 

So at noon we were approximately 65nm south of Port Moresby in Papua New Guinea, 370 nm North East of Cairns and 380nm East of Cape York, the most northern point of mainland Australia.  We start getting serious about transiting the Torres Straits shipping channel in about 250nm.