24 hour Run     Log trip (through the water)          98.3 Nm (983.0 Nm cumulative)

24 hour Run     GPS     (overground)                   95.7 Nm

Midday wind and weather                                    Force 2 WSW      Sunny   

Sea state:                                                          Tiny waves on a long swell . 

Temperature:                                                      29.0C

 

As can be seen from the distance covered, the past 24 hours have been somewhat frustrating - we were forced, through both lack of wind and the fact that any slight wind was on the nose, to resort to motoring, which we did for most of the afternoon. In order to conserve our fuel (we reckon that with the additional 2 cans on board, we have adequate for the trip) and also to gain the advantage of the winds shown on the grib files downloaded at the start of the day, we then sailed towards the Mauritanian coast. Unfortunately the better winds expected never materialised during the night and we made slow and rather uninteresting progress.

 

The major event of the day was Glen's success on the fishing front - he landed a small tuna. Much of the concern over the fishing was the despatch of the catch to the pan - the winch handle was used with 2 accurate blows by Glen, who then prepared the fish for the evening meal. John drawing on all his culinary skills decided to lightly fry it in Olive Oil and serve it as a starter with salad cream and tomato (very tasty)  - he then followed this with a delicious spaghetti bolognaise. We are certainly eating very well with the assistance of various cookbooks and our own ingenuity(?).

 

Fishing is now a major activity and John has just caught another small tuna which he despatched in true First Responder style  with several blows to the head - it is Glen's turn to cook this evening, so the style of its cooking is not yet known.

 

We are now sailing close to the wind slowly due south about 160 miles off the coast and from the look of today's grib files we will be making for the south east side of the Cape Verde archipelago where we hope to finally catch some trade winds, but we still have some 300 miles before we get there (note: still about 2,300 miles to Barbados in total, but we are confident that speeds will increase from this evening). 

 

phc