34 01N 45 16W
Osprey
John Bowering
Sun 31 May 2009 20:56
kept us all amused. Not only are we now starting to run down on stores such
as chocolate and marathons but we now have weevils in the flour and
biscuits. Kuki found the second batch of weevils in the pancake flour this
morning whilst making breakfast. The flour was tipped into a large mixing
bowl and Charles spent half an hour picking them out with a spoon. Kuki then
mixed in the water only to find that the weevils larvae floated to the top.
Both John and Charles were happy with the additional protein in the diet but
Kuki was not impressed and consigned the whole lot to Neptune. Charles is
also starting to have some trouble with his teeth and we have concluded that
this is not a result of his flying head butt into the window but the onset
of scurvy. Therefore we have broken out the emergency lime juice and started
a lime juice ration. Finally we found the wind again at 0730 this morning
and the pretty blue sail was soon flying with Osprey streaking along at 6
knots in 10 knots of wind. We have been able to continue this all day until
the wind became too strong for the large sail at around 1600 and we dowsed
it in favour of the main and 135% Genoa. We are still getting 6 knots but
know in 15 to 20 knot winds.We have also had a little rain and Charles is on
deck in his shorts wearing a yellow sowester, diving goggles and wellies -
looks as though he has escaped from a lunatic asylum. We are now heading
fairly quickly towards the latitude of The Azores but still have a lot of
easting to make up once we find some westerly winds.We had originally hoped
to arrive on the 3rd and now looks like the 8th with the delay being made up
entirely of the 5 days we were without wind south of Bermuda. We may have to
look at Kuki's program once we get there as she only had leave of absence
from her father for a month and it will be well past that by the time we get
to Morocco.
"Notes from a Small Boat with Stowaways" - a good day, thankfully some wind enabling us to turn the engine off after 24 hrs and start sailing. The pretty blue sail was quickly deployed, in what is fast becoming a well executed drill.
As for John's submission for the blog above, he has obviously finally decided to attempt to get his own back for the numerous comments regarding him that have appeared over the past two weeks. Of course, this is an ill fated strategy and one that can only lead to more ridicule from the remainder of the crew. This was amply demonstrated by the threat of the crew to leave him high and dry on arrival in the Azores - this occurred when John decided to annouce that there was only 840 miles to go. Not far according to him, but this from the same man who said it would be an easy 18 day passage - is that laughter I hear as today is our sixteenth day at sea.
Anyway, the most monumentous occasion happened last night as dusk was approaching. Charles was on deck, as per usual, when he spotted one dorsal fin and then another. He shouted below "Dolphins" - well it is the fastest Kuki has moved whilst onboard and certainly got her off her bunk! (must remember that in future) A glorious sight was beheld, as Osprey was joined by a group of 5 dolphins who proceeded to spend about 10 minutes frolicking about the bow - they are certainly beautiful creatures and so playful.
The same cannot be said for our Stowaways - Weevils!!! They were first discovered a couple of days ago in the pasta, so Charles duly fished them out of the boiling water with a spoon. Only there was one tenacious, by now dead, weevil that refused to be caught so it remained - however, the answer Kuki received was that they were all gone. It wasn't till after she had eaten that the tenacious one was mentioned - needless to say Kuki was less than impressed. Anyway, this morning John demanded another hot breakfast, I think the fault with his weightloss program lies firmly at his own feet. so Kuki got out the pancake mix. A scream later and the whole of this area of the North Atlantic knew there was weevils in the packet. So Charles duly set about removing them, only this time as it had been a longer period there were the weevils and their wriggling larvae. Anyway 30 minutes later he had sanitised enough mix for breakfast only to be told there were still some larvae in there - Charles saw no problem with this extra protien but was overruled.
John & Charles spent another couple of hours this morning inside the engine compartment working on the generator, which has continued to play up - definitely a fuel problem, and we think air in the system. Anyway, another filter was changed, the system bled and connections tightened which seems to have done the job but only time will tell.
So as dusk approaches Kuki is cooking the tuna caught a few days ago, whilst dreaming of dry land and the fact that she is likely to leave Osprey in the Azores. The same offer was strangely not extended to Charles, but that could be because John is afraid he would leave wearing his sea boots, a souwester, diving mask and not much else - a sight he doesn't think Osprey would ever live down. John continues his quest for buddhist enlightenment, which the rest of the crew has decided just entails eating lots and sleeping a great deal. As for Charles he remains the stalwart of Osprey, quietly going about the business of getting her to the Azores whislt providing regular amusing incidents for the crews' morale.