Last night was also the first relatively warm night I encountered so I decided to drag all my pillows and blankets up on deck and build a nest for the night next to the wheel and under the stars.
It was really calm, we were set on a good course and I set my alarm for the usual nap time before I have a look around and make sure we are still alone and the sail and course are still set.

By now I hear and feel as soon as something is off so I open my eyes anyway..

I felt incredibly happy looking out to the sea and see the thick curtian of stars hang deep until the brink of horizon and also greet the moon who gives me a bigger and bigger smile every night at the moment... I was so grateful and full of love for Freedom and my parents and all my friends who always belived that Id eventually sit here and find my place in this universe!

Going to sleep with so much love in my heart was lovely and I had some great deep naps from 9pm until 2 am when something was just a tad too calm. I looked up and around the boat and everything seemed ok apart from the wind being down to 4knts now... Until I turned around and... Just like in the movies.. Saw a big heavy black raincloud taking her aim for Freedom and I! (pretty weird sight- a big black cloud in front of black but twinkling night sky!)

Reacting surprisingly quickly all the pillows flew into the cabin and I was in my full oilies and at the helm when the wind picked up, the gates opened and we got properly rained on.

This happened twice more until sunrise and by the thrird time i got rained on that night I was reasonably grumpy.

Texting Maud and Marc in the morning for our respective position update they had the audacity to tell me they have not had a single squall.. Not a way to start my day! (I am joking, they are lovely and I am so glad they stayed dry ;) )

The rest of today passed in the roller-coaster just like it started: I have never seen this many rainbows in one day in my entire life (8 so far!), I got hit by less squalls than I could have and I spent five blissful hours helming when my autopilot had enough again for a while.

A major bummer nevertheless was seeing a lot of rubbish floating past today.

There were large plastic films, broken pieces of thicker plastic and random things I couldnt identify... And they were all out of reach of my boat hook.. Which left me on the brink of tears of anger on more than one occasion!

Looking at the next couple of days, I am not entirely sure about the best route to take to the Caribbean yet.

The general route is obvious but the details are a bit frustrating as I simply can not go where I want to go sometimes, be it to avoid extensive flogging of the sails, rolling of the boat or tricky manouvers at night that involve being on the foredeck when it is actually quite rolly.

Id also like to go a bit more north on my westerly route but I do consider to just go west and stay close ish to Bluebonnet in case something goes wrong.

Anyway, at the moment, despite the challenges, Freedom and I are fairing pretty well and I am hopeing that we can contine our majorly lucky streak for the next two to three weeks!

I hope you had a good start to your week, sending salty ocean air!

(I am also trying to work out why I can not send pictures at the moment and hope to have a solution soon!)

Sent from my Huawei phone