Ooops
Sweet Dreams
Roz Preston /Ed Phillips
Sat 26 Nov 2022 16:21
We are now more than half way to Grenada, just rolling along day after day and now the wind has calmed down a bit, it’s actually very relaxing.
Trying to figure out the time changes is challenging. We are moving through 3 time zones en route, but the question is when to move the clock back. Our last attempt led to various alarms going off at random times in the night, but somehow or other we all managed to pitch up in the cockpit at the right time for our watch. Day and night are more or less the same length, 12 hours, so my watch starts in darkness and Angus gets to see the sunrise.
Other than that there is not much to see except the endless, restless ocean and the clouds during the day. At night there is an amazing multitude of stars overhead. The moon is beginning to make an appearance but is not above the horizon for long. I’m looking forward to more moonlight as the week progresses. Yesterday we had a strange visit from 5 egrets, well away from land and clearly eyeing us up as a possible place to take a rest. After a few passes they decided they didn’t like the look of us so off they went. I hope they found a nice comfortable oil tanker or cruise ship.
We had a less fortuitous encounter with the unluckiest flying fish ever. On a nocturnal visit to the loo the other night, I got a nasty shock to discover a flying fish upside down in the toilet. Ed was on watch so Between fits of the giggles I persuaded him I wasn’t making it up. He had heard a loud bang earlier in the night and thought we might have glanced off a log or something, but no, we figured out that the fish had flown in through the portlight, hit the wall of the heads and bounced back straight down the loo. You couldn’t make it up. Im kicking myself now for not having taken a picture but I’m not generally in the habit of taking my phone to the loo in the middle of the night and by the time I thought about it the poor fish was already baiting the fishing hook.
Our record there is unspectacular. Just as well the provisions are more or less holding up (there will be a mad scramble for the nearest salad bar when we hit land). Some very fine fish have escaped, but so far the flying fish has been our biggest catch on this leg and somehow drowning in the toilet make him a less than appetising prospect.
There are a few other boats not far away. We can see them on the screen at night, but they are too far over the horizon to be within sight. That will change as we get closer to Grenada and our courses start to converge again. Caledonia has been our closest companion, usually about 10 miles ahead according to the daily position report we get from the ARC people. Which tells us that we are doing well, holding our position somewhere in the middle of the fleet and a very respectable 6th out of the 17 boats in category 1D. Not too shabby, as long as we don’t get light airs. 20 knots is what we like, not too much, not too little, good for 7 knots or 140 miles a day.
So I’m back in the galley today, Angus is on fishing watch and Ed and Dick are in day 2 of trying to find out where we are using the sextant and the 10 volumes of tables and calculations that go with it. Advanced maths and serious headaches are involved. I will be very grateful if we have total loss of power, but at the moment I am very pleased that satellite communications are hear to light our way steadily across the pond.
Hope this one makes it through the ether!
Sweet Dreams
Listening out on channels 16 and 72.
Sent from my iPad