26:13.587 S  154:44.568 W

29/5/09

18:00 

It suddenly got dark at 16:30 so we moved the clocks ahead another hour. We are going practically due East anyway. As its dark, the squalls are gathering. Wind is West Force 4.

We will run out of wind in a couple of days and the last day or so be motoring into light head winds. At least I hope they’re light. Steve has concocted a fish pie, our third meal from the Big Eye Tunas.

03:30

The wind has dropped to Force 2 and it’s not enough to move us so up goes the iron mainsail.

According to the GRIB files we should have wind for another 12 hours. But we don’t. 

06:00

Wind is WSW Force 1. The motor trundles on. No moon. No stars. It’s dark out there.  Oddly enough no squalls either.

10:30

I slept last night with the fan  on.  It was hot and muggy. 

Overnight the wind tripled in strength getting up to sometimes even 9 knots. More importantly it went NNW which even though it’s only Force 2, allows us to make nearly 6 knots under sail. Very warm very overcast day. Very pleased with the new sails as we couldn’t have done this well with the original ones.

14:00

The sun has burnt off the cloud cover and it’s   27 C in the cockpit. Wind’s gone North Force 3 but we’re still making a gentle 6 knots.  Very idyllic sailing. Yesterday’s run a modest 156 miles including 7 engine hours. It doesn’t look like we’ll have much wind for the remaining  410 miles.  Our ETA is looking more and more like the morning of the 2^nd.