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Imagine of Plymouth
Arthur
Thu 29 Nov 2007 10:56
Hello people,
 
sorry for no blog yesterday, was very frustarting. The night was Ok but in the morning we where very slow, trying to make headway in little breeze. During the night we where almost heading for the USA and when we gybed for Africa!! Anyway the wind did come in yesterday afternoon in the form of a very big squall. We where hunting them down but this one was big and we had the kit up. Some slick crew work by arthur, rudy and mark and she was down. Wind increased from 5 kntos to 25 knots in under 4 minutes!! As there was little breeze around us we gybed a few time in squall to stay with it. This worked and we made good progress.
 
Arthur was on cooking duty and heated one of Renates earlier prepared meals. I can not stress how easy this when it is going rough or people are feeling a bit sick. As we are running the generator approx 6 hours a day we can also have showers (warm) coffee from an espresso machine and Arthur actaully got the Miele vacuum cleaner out.
 
We also tried to fish but lost the complete first real and on the second attempt a dolphin snatched the fish of the hook. So no luck so far. The night was uneventfull although we had a lot of wind direction changes and one squall during Marks watch. We have been heading south for most of the night to get to the trade winds. They have still not come in so we gybed put the kite up. Now heading 260 towards St Lucia. Only 2000 miles to go!! We have covered 641 miles so far.
For those interested our position is 23 07 168N and 025 05 949 W
 
Cruising along at 8-9 knots with a VMG of nearly the same!!
 
So we are all happy sailors, we had our first fried breakfast which was lovely. Chris is obvioulsy settling in nicely because he did not get ou7t of bed untill 1030. He has discovered the advantages of earplugs. You now need shout to get him up for his watch!
 
Robert is longing for the shore side facilities. He had his first No2 today after nearly 5 days at sea, it was not pleasant..........he came up with tears in his eyes
 
So what else is there to say, the boat is performing above expecations. We are designing in our heads now the ideal cruising boat as there are quite a few niggles we like to change especially down below. Last night proved again that the open ballroom saloon is not very pleasant to move around in any seaway. It a bit of a dive. The galley and chart table are very pleasant to work in. The cockpit has got several levels with the most comfortable positions being taken by Robert and Chris. Arthur and Rudy hand steer the boat most of the time although the autopliot does a great job in light airs. Have now also become familiar with the multi display unit for radar and navigation. We have started to play with it tracking squalls and boats, of the latter we have seen remarkably few. Usually only one boat in sight.........For Robert it was today the first occasion he was out of sight of land and any boats although I broke the news within a few minutes that i could spot a yacht 4 miles away.
 
Time for shower and get ready to do a bit behin the wheel although I think the autohelm is doing better job at the moment than I can!!
 
Take care of you all, feel free to send us an email but no pictures or videos as that does not work to my knowledge.
 
Regards from Imagine of Plymouth
 
Rudy, Arthur, Chris, Mark and Robert.