Sunday 24^th January 2010

I woke up before the alarm went off at 07.45.  The view from my bunk through the porthole to the left was of sea (not surprising really!) and the sun rising. It was going to be another lovely day.

 I took over the watch from Andy at 08.00.  Charlize was already hopeful that someone would feed her. We put a small amount of sea water in the versatile blue bucket and put the fish bits in there.  She was a bit confused at first and had to be shooshed towards the bucket where she then finished her breakfast in a matter of seconds.  We think this way she gets some water with the fish and indeed later in the day she was seen drinking from the bucket.  Her beak is often covered with salt which her body is excreting and we have noticed that she wipes the side of her beak on any convenient edge after she has eaten – perhaps she is getting rid of the salt build up?

The wind and swells had eased a little but we were going too fast for fishing. I forgot to tell you that we had another fish on the line (not the rod) yesterday but it was a huge Dorado and Andy couldn’t pull in the line as we were going so fast and the fish was so big.  It came off the hook and so we are not going to put out the line until we can be sure to land anything we catch.

The skipper decided mid morning that it was time for the asymmetric sail (slightly heavier than the spinnaker but lighter than the genoa which we had been sailing with). This allows us better direction and speed in the lighter winds.  We were able to make 240° flying this and good speed. It was an incredibly hot day and after lunch we all craved the shade.  Our cold drink input is up but even these only provided temporary respite as we were sweating just lying down.  The sea temperature is up to 30°.

Nature notes:  There were two tropic birds this morning.  It seemed one was chasing the other away but perhaps it was a mating ritual – I really have a lot to learn about ornithology! We saw the usual flying fish and later in the evening when the swell died down a lot some large leaping fish which we thought might be very big tuna. We had the line out at this stage but didn’t catch anything.  As the big tuna can be in the hundreds of kilos it was probably a good thing!

Just as the sun was setting we decided to take in the asymmetric sail as the wind had died away to almost nothing. I hope the photos come out as the shadows of the crew against the setting sun were very dramatic.  The bird is very curious and always goes to the foredeck to watch what is going on when the sails are changed. We put up the genoa but the wind had dropped so much that there was no option but to motor. 

Food wise today, for lunch we had coleslaw along with some tomatoes in olive oil and cold black eye bean curry.  We are saving the last of the bread for more bacon sandwiches so our carbs came from sesame seed crisp bread (not wonderful!). Our meat protein was from corned beef and pate and we still have some Canarian cheese which is tasting stronger and stronger!   As it was Sunday we gathered on deck in the early evening for olives and crisps (3 tubes of Pringles left).  Peter cooked dinner.  We have been storing a whole cooking chorizo in the microwave and this was transformed into a delicious spicy casserole along with onions, peppers, garlic and tomatoes. He served it with the last of the potatoes (boiled) and we had yoghurts as dessert. 

After dinner we looked for the cause of the horrid smell in Peter’s cabin.  He has sprayed his sailing shoes with deodorant so we knew it wasn’t that and the vegetables which are stored in there in two laundry baskets were the immediate suspects.  Sadly one of the tomatoes had turned to liquid so the mystery was quickly solved and fragrance returned to the fore cabin!

We had to motor all night and as I write this on Monday morning there is still no wind.