Update from halfway
Stromboli comes home
John and Sue Chadwick
Tue 22 May 2007 01:12
We crossed the halfway point during the night so we can now (slowly) start counting down. We've all placed bets on our arrival day - probably 1st, 2nd or 3rd June. Last night was a cracker - the milky way was spread our right over the boat. There's a main belt and a subsidiary which converges like railway points. It looks like sort of wispy cloud but, in fact, its billions and billions of stars. The plough was visible as well looking more like a giant tick than a question mark at this latitude - hope that's an omen. The dawn is getting earlier as we sail away from the tropics so the nights are no longer so long. We've split the watches so tha R starts his at 2100 through to 0000. I take over until 0300 (dog watch) and C comes up and stays on watch until we tell him its time for him to make the tea. No ships for 4 days.
Yesterday R got an email from Rhona. I thought he should read it in a place of quiet and solitude (= the chart table). I watched him from the cockpit. He read it through carefully, took his glasses off and wiped them (this for R is the equivalent of doing a whirly dervish), put them back on and read it all again. He came back up saying something like, ' the wee lass has only e're wriiten two lines to me'. Anyway I could see he was very pleased and touched. We dug out his whisky bottle for him to share round.
This morning we opened our halfway packs which were great fun - including a balloon powered escape helicopter. (I'm not sure if C looked at his a little wistfully). We're saving most of the present to open over the next 10 days or so. 1141 miles to go. We're getting into the south west corner of the Azores high so we're got south easterly winds F5 which is creating a fair amount of swell and chop - spray all over the ship - but speed isn't bad. We need to sail another 600-700m miles before we can relax (we have fuel for about 500 miles). We had Grits this morning (C bought them on the basis that as they are made by Quaker they must be porridge. They're OK with Maple Syrup (although on balance I'd just as soon chuck the grits way and just have a spoon of Maple Syrup). R though they might come in handy in an emergency - sprinkled over the side they could be used to calm the seas around the boat.
More soon. J, C,& R
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