Blog 8 - Tuesday 3^rd December 2007

Wash Day

After all the drama of yesterday, today has been rather quiet so far (touch wood). The rig survived the night and is still looking good although there is little wind today and we’ve still only got the mainsail up as we no longer have the luxury of a pole to pole out the jib. High winds of 25 knots are forecast from this afternoon for the next few days so if everything bears up OK, we should at least make up a few miles over the coming days. Although when the wind hits we will go back to the sleepless nights and bunk ping pong, and taking enormous efforts to make a cup of tea let alone cook. We’ll be making the most of the fresh meat we have on board tonight in case we don’t have enough calm conditions to cook properly again for a few days. From tomorrow we could be living out of cans again. Mmm tinned chilli anyone? But hey, at least the conditions will move us on and we’ll be closer to St Lucia and the rum punch!

This morning the sun is shining and the weather is still warm and sunny. George is running the fuel cell so with that purring in the background Becci and I finally got around to doing the washing we talked about yesterday. A couple of hours later with sore hands from all the scrubbing by hand it was all done. I’d forgotten how much hard work washing by hand could be. The boat now looks hilarious with clothing hanging all around the decks. It’s good that no one can see us out here in the Atlantic as we look like a floating laundry rather than the Voller ‘flagship’.

Captain Pugwash has also taken advantage of the calm conditions and learned how to helm the boat. Making a very good job of it he is too!

Till tomorrow.

Justine