Day 3
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Position
at
All through 28th we
continue to progress at 8 knots on a south-west track, bareheaded with steep
seas of 4 metres. The wind from north-east at 20-25 knots. Even if the sea was
calm enough to hoist a spinnaker we would not be able to continue in this
direction, or within 40 degrees of it, because of the asymmetric kites that we
carry. We really need to continue in this direction for another day before
gybing off to the right, and on track to
We are plagued with spurious
problems in sending emails and blog updates, and try to enlist the aid of
Blenheim Groups IT manager, Matt Le Huray. If they cant be resolved we may well
resort to just voice communication for position reporting and weather. We put in
a call to our ‘ground control’, In the evening Mik cooked a delicious quasi
chicken curry mixed with the remnants of the previous night’s Irish stew. A
bottle of wine and cashew nuts for pre-prandials. During the night we had a practice ‘man
overboard’ drill. It wasn’t exactly a planned event, just that one of the wrist
bands worn by the duty watch was accidentally triggered by one of the Petes. The
off-watchers reacted smartly, ‘ anyone fallen overboard?’ they shouted. The
chart plotter promptly marked the position and course to steer to retrieve them,
which of course was academic since they were both still on board.
But it all worked as expected, and hopefully never has to prove its
worth. Dolphins followed the boat at times during
the night. As the sun rose on 29th we were
surprised to see a larger boat than ourselves crossing our stern, not more than
a quarter of a mile away. We had lost touch with the fleet when they all headed
west. We decided that if he wanted the dubious honour of being the furthest
south, then we would oblige by gybing right and heading for the fleet. We didn’t
exactly turn right since this would have been a hairy manoeuvre in
these seas. Instead, we turned left through 270 degrees, which amounts to the
same thing but is a lot more controlled. We settled on a heading of
270 degrees, and found we could hoist and carry our number 1 genoa on a direct
line to
The old
men of the sea?; No, Tweedledum and Tweedledee. (poetic compilation attributed
to Mik U) |