Fw: N 36 47 W 12 00
Gryphon II
Chris and Lorraine Marchant
Fri 4 Sep 2009 17:11
----- Original Message -----
From: Chris
Marchant
To: Web Diary
Sent: Tuesday, September 01, 2009 4:56 PM
Subject: N 36 47 W 12 00 We left Cascais at midday on Monday once the wind had
picked up and were soon off the continental shelf. At last we do not have to
continually avoid fishing floats.
We had a rather sleepless night in a sloppy sea but
hopefully we will soon get used to watch routines and learn to sleep peacefully
whilst the boat heaves and groans around us. We are sailing now at 7 knots with
the Portuguese Trades giving us a steady Force 4 to 5 from the north. For
those in the drizzle of the UK, the sky is blue with fluffy clouds and the
temperature in the mid 80s We have already covered 150 miles towards
our destination of Porto Santo now
300 miles to the south west.
We left Cascais, with our friends Andy and Sue aboard
Spruce.They kept pace with us last night but they have now disappeared beyond
the horizon behind us.
The cruising chute was hauled this morning in lighter
winds and has set nicely giving us this good speed. Other than that and
keeping watch, today we have had a lazy day with the
boat mostly looking after itself with either the autopilot or the wind vane
doing the steering. I did a noon sight for the first time in 28 years and
managed to get our latitude within a mile ...not bad for a battered plastic
sextant and a rusty mind!
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