Fwd: Day 20: Land Ahoy
Purple Mist
Skipper: Kate Cope
Sun 29 Jan 2023 21:50
12:19.805N 60:38.646 W
At about 22:00 GMT yesterday Claire spotted land! Yes the lights of Barbados were clearly visible on the horizon. It was a moment to celebrate …bring on the apple juice !
Around the west side of Barbados there was plenty of commercial vessels including the cruise ships Ventura and Britannia just leaving the port of Bridgetown. Ventura is a regular in Southampton and so it funny to come all this way and be crossing paths with the same ships as at home.
Overnight was light so we’re flying out biggest S2 spinnaker to keep moving, we are a lot more confident with the squalls now leaving the kite up until the last minute then dropping like a well oiled machine. If only we had been this good on Day 2 …oh well.
It’s still tough to get up for the early morning shifts and I spent a lot of this mornings watch 20 minute cat napping on the beanbag whilst George steered the S2…he is so good! Anyway imagine my horror when I finally awoke to find us in the centre of 3 squalls. Thankfully all had missed us.
As I write the finish line is getting closer , less than a “Cherbourg race “ to go. If the wind holds think we will be finishing around 3am GMT which I know is a very unfriendly time to finish.