Our flying friends and other tidbits
Miss Molly 4
Bob & Peggy Wilkerson/Geoff & Merel Pettifer
Fri 4 Jul 2008 21:09
This morning a 20 lbs tuna must have nudged the regular dorado out of the way of our lure. Geoff had quite a hard time to unhook this 20 lbs of Nothing-But-Sheer-Muscle and release it again - way too much tuna for our taste! We want our daily dorado back!
Today was a gorgeous day, sunny and very comfortable wing & wing sailing. Lots of flying fish around, amazing how they fly out of the water, away from the boat, in squadrons of sometimes 50 - 100 fish and the distances they manage to fly - wow! This confirms how just the flying fish is as the symbol of the OCC - our Ocean Cruising Club.
Our speed however left something to be desired. We lost some of our current and ended up with another day under the 200 mile mark. We must have gotten spoilt somewhere, honestly - 184 Nm is not bad either. Since the afternoon the wind has picked up nicely and are we doing about 8.5 kts, so hopefully another 200+ day tomorrow.
For the first time since we started this trip we are enjoying some moonlight, although it is still the tiniest slither of a New Moon. We've been feeling a bit like Stevie Wonder here on our night watches, feeling our way through the cockpit and looking out over the dark sea in search of lights, which, with one exception of a tuna boat, are never there, apart from the instrument lights that are on the darkest light setting in the cockpit. In fact, it is still bloody dark out there, that moon better grow soon to change that! And it will, of course.
The forecast tells us we should be having steady 15 kts winds for the next few days and we have found our favourable current again, so that sounds positive too.
Back to the darkness for now, cheers!
Geoff & Merel