Rowtec Support vessel "Desiderata"
Carl Theakston Mark Terry
Thu 2 Jul 2009 13:06
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The weather has taken a turn for the worse yet
again! although this does not come as too much of a surprise now as we are used
to the regularity of the lows tracking NE and furnishing us with 15-20ft seas
and 25-35 kts of wind. It is sensible to not have too many pre-conceptions
regarding the weather on a voyage of this distance and length, but i think we
all had thoughts of the Indian Oceans beautiful, azure, flat calm seas and
sunshine to help us on our way, unfortunately this has been a rarity.
Food has become a routine, functional affair and
the crew has resorted to interesting combinations to spice up meal times, the
current favourites being tinned fruit and weetabix and grated chocolate as
a sweetener for tea. Off watch time has been
taken up with everybody embracing the art of celestial navigation, be it book
study, swinging the sextant or working up sights.
Highlights of the day have been taken up with
talk-offs, whereby the crew discusses the days highlights that often
results in the most profound of insights and the correction of the worlds'
wrongs. Bren has a particular talent for such.
After over ten weeks away from land, the mood
onboard is as good as could be as expected and certainly improved
by the westward course we have managed to take over the last 10 days. We
are looking forward to hopefully finding the Kiwi boys and ushering them ashore
over the next week, ensuring their safe passage.
On a practical note we have enjoyed seeing the two
pairs boats as they look to break the 1000Nm to go barrier today. In
seeing Southern Cross we resupplied them with 10 days worth of food that should
hopefully see them through. Both sets of lads were keen to gauge the
others progress, position and plight and were both in high
spirits.
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