Passage Day 4
Sarah Grace goes to sea
Chris Yerbury and Sophy White
Thu 15 Feb 2007 15:38
Cubagua to Port Antonio,
Jamaica, Thursday 15th February 2007
N 17' 28.40'
W075' 03.322'
Well we are all still
here. The boat is shambolic inside, half our stuff seems to be on the
floor. It has been boiling hot, and we have been unable to open the
hatches because too much water has been pounding down, either from squalls or
waves. The autohelm died last night, we think from drowning, so hand
helming for a while. This is like standing on a table top
balanced on a large ball, with someone throwing buckets of salty water at you,
to the Guiness ad. surfing sound track, and trying to steer. We have
resurrected the hydrovane, to give us some respite, and it seems to be coping on
this reach. Thank goodness the winds have moderated to a useful
18knots.
We are very tired, and it
is possible that we might reach Port Antonio at around 2am tomorrow. Chris
thinks it is ok to attempt a night entry, something we normally avoid at all
costs. It is hard to gauge your arrival time on a five day passage, as the
winds can vary so much. We have Reed's Caribbean Nautical Almanac, which
is very helpful. We are presently navigating off a National Geographic
'West Indies and Central America' schoolroom map.......
We saw some lovely
dolphins yesterday, says Chris, 'Some good things have happened on this
trip'. We miss Steve, who came across the Atlantic with us. Come
back Steve, all is forgiven!