38:22N 42:49W

665 miles west of Horta, Azores.

Thursday 9^th June 2011

There is really very little to report from the last 24 hours!  It was overcast all of last night and most of today.  Though we have now had 2 lightning free nights in a row!  The wind has been mainly light (8 – 12 kts) from the S to SE.  The sea has been fairly calm so we’ve been making good progress in the light winds, with our latest noon to noon run of 141 miles.  We currently have 665 miles to go.  If we can keep the speed up we are hoping to arrive before the end of Tuesday 14 June, which will be two weeks since we left Bermuda.

We still have that pesky current against us, it briefly went north and then south but has yet to give us a boost to the east.

We’ve not experienced any of the cold temperatures that the other boats have been reporting, but that’s probably because we have not had to go so far north to get the wind.   It’s still shorts and t-shirts during the day.  It has been very damp though so nothing is drying out.  The deck cushions briefly dried the other day but then a wave got them!

Alan repaired the leaking cooling water intake pipe on the engine with some magic epoxy putty, which fortunately appears to have survived the hour of motoring we’ve done since the repair.  Fingers crossed it will last the whole way to Horta.

Mary is getting addicted to iPhone scrabble and reported a high score for today of 434 points!

We had a very brief visit from some dolphins last night, but it was dark so we couldn’t see them very well.  We first became aware of them when we could hear their ‘squeaking’ through the hull when sitting down below.   That’s it though, they must all be following everyone else.

We’ve just been headed so for the first time can’t lay The Azores!   That isn’t what the forecast says so not sure what our tactics are now.

Mary & Alan

Position at 1830 UTC 9/6/11

38˚ 22N

42˚ 49W

Wind:                   155˚T/ 12 kts

COG / SOG:        070˚T / 6.0

665nm to Horta.