(Blog No.43) Beer running low - but 'Stella' in our sights!
Catou
Paul and Sylvie Tucker
Mon 13 Dec 2010 16:24
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14:07.45N 53:19.74W
Monday 13th December (Day 22)
Noon
Position:
14 deg 7' N 53 deg 20' W
Daily
Run: 156'
Average
Speed: 6.50
Knots
Total average speed:
5.21 Knots
Total distance covered: 2766'
Distance to
go:
444'
No. motoring
hours: 57.7 hours
ETA St.
Lucia: @
6 knots Thursday 16th @ 1400 hrs
@
5.5 " Thursday 16th @ 2030
hrs
@
5 "
Friday 17th @ 0500 hrs
3 days to go! We have had some lovely sailing for
the last 36 hours. The wind has been about Force 4 and on the starboard
quarter. Dobbie doesn't steer very accurately when we have the wind
astern, so we have elected to steer manually for the last couple of days, and it
has been fun in these lovely conditions. We are maintaining about 6 knots
(noon - noon was 6.5 knots - see above), but the wind is predicted to drop
tomorrow, and we may elect to motor to keep the average up to 6 knots for a
Thursday afternoon arrival.
Ben had a furrowed look on his brow about an hour ago -
the beer is getting low he announced. We should just hold out, and I know
we have a few cans tucked away from when we left England, so glad we have a
few reserves. Other stores are looking good and the meat has kept
very well in the vacuum-packed bags in the bottom of the fridge. We had
some lovely steaks last night.
Now my camera has been lost, we have to start taking
more pictures with Sylvie's camera - to catch a few 'at sea' moments
of life aboard 'Catou' while we are still out here.
I make daily rounds on deck and study everything as
carefully as possible to see if there is anything that is not correct.
It's difficult to spot potential problems, as sometimes they are not
obvious. As somebody said at one of the lectures before we left Las Palmas
- ' your biggest enemy is chafing! And it is too! All the time you
are checking to see what is rubbing against what. We missed one bit of
chafing on one of the sheets (ropes that control the sails), and by the time we
spotted it, it was 1/3 way through the rope. It's still OK, and plenty of
strength fortunately. We have bits of rag attached to lifelines, sheets,
over shackles and protruding pins. The anti-chafe rags are held on by duck
tape - it's beginning to look like the boat is held together with the
stuff!
No more 'tales from the deep' to tell you about
today. We haven't seen dolphins for well over a week sad to say. In
fact I think we last saw them off the Cape Verde islands about the same time we
saw the whales. They are lovely companions and really fun to watch, so we
miss their company.
Another yacht called 'Stella' called us on
VHF yesterday and we have had a few conversations with her since.
They are only about 12 miles away from us, but we haven't been able to see them
yet. They are just to our south and a little further west than us at
present. We were on the same pontoon in Las Palmas, so we look forward to
seeing them all on arrival in Rodney Bay.
Best wishes to all. Paul, Sylvie and Ben.
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