4am hi

Quest
Jack and Hannah Ormerod and Lucia, Delphine & Fin
Thu 30 Mar 2017 19:45
Position: 17:35.707N 62:43.807W

4am. But for once I'm not up at this hour for Lu's school. The clocks changing in the UK last weekend has made her school a bit painful. I joined her English class on Monday morning and spent the first few minutes wondering why it was the end of the lesson.. A rather sheepish start to the week.

No, instead of plugging Lulu in, I am doing my moonless night watch at Quest's helm, writing this as everyone sleeps. We have sailed 121.32 nautical miles since 11am yesterday! Pretty good going. As we left the BVIs the water went from turquoise to an instant velvety purple. We all took a deep breath.

Wind so far has been kind; rippling out behind Quest. We've had almost all of Quest's white cloth out. Just a little bit of her parachute main sail still reefed. No need to pop a Kalm tonight 🙃. About 60nm left to go to Antigua. Hopefully we'll be there for lunch, accounting for some possible slowing down. We're planning to head to Jolly Harbour so we can catch up on sleep while Lu and Du can go to shore and watch episodes of Jessie. Wifi starved children! They'll be as happy as two old ladies..

George, the autopilot is earning his keep now, though he turned off again randomly just as I started my watch at 2am.. It's like his computer brain has a problem with me. With Jack he's like a happy puppy 🐶 with the ability to steer for thousands of miles unaided. Typical! Is there no one on Quest I don't have to scold? I'm having to spend my watch making sure he stays on. I might know where the hidden chocolate is (in my pocket) but there are disadvantages to being Quest's unlikely matriarch...

We are just passing St Eustatius in the darkness. The island's lights are glimmering like thousands of cats' eyes in the distance. We've come right through the islands tonight; St Martin, Anguilla, St Barts on Quest's port left side and Saba, St Eustatius and soon, St Kitts and Nevis on her starboard right. The brightest lights so far have been the cruise ships. Six or so have crisscrossed our path. One's a thousand feet, another nine hundred.. compared to our fifty. They can see us on AIS, same as we see them on our screen. In person, they look like they've stolen a bit out of the sun. I wonder if they can see us at all.

Love from Quest and her crew xx