We crossed the equator last night at 19:12 Brazil time and celebrated the occasion with a small wine and beer. It was a beautiful evening with a clear sky, a full moon and warm light breeze. Claire had cooked a delicious dinner of pasta and bacon and life just couldn’t have been better!

We are sailing under genoa, mizzen and mizzen staysail.  We are using the staysail in preference to the mainsail for when we get a line squall it is so much quicker to dump it rather than take a reef in the main. The wind speed is generally 15 to 20 knots although in squalls it can top 30 knots. Moonstone chortles along at well over 5 knots and the current is boosting our speed over ground to over 8 knots, a lot better speeds than on our Atlantic crossing.

At some point soon the wind will probably fade away as we cross the inter tropical convergence zone but we might be lucky and keep a fair, if light, breeze.