16:06.7N 37:23.5W Stormy night - sunny day

Tatt av vinden
Bjørn Larsen
Fri 5 Dec 2008 18:35
Huh, that was some night! The evening was peaceful, but we knew we would
enter an area of squalls. So we prepared a little. Rolled in a little on the
main and took the pole out of the genoa. The course was ok anyhow, we headed
more to the south to avoid the nasty area.

Nine thirty Eva called me and told me that rain was seen on the radar. And
rain means wind. I just got into my foul weather clouths before the wind
picked up, and in less than ten minuits we encountered 35 knots of wind,
gusting signifacantly more than 40. The gybe preventer broke, and we
experienced two involuntary gybes before we were able to reduce the main to
fairely nothing. We still made 5 - 6 knots on possibely no more than 10
sqare meters of sail.

Luckily no dammage. The wind ceised a little after an hour or so, but we
still had between 25 and 30 knots through the night and the morning. Among
the lessons learned was that saveing power by not lighting the compass was
bad policy in a stormy night. Before we put on the light I was unable to
steer a stable course. Wind instruments was not enough.

What we experienced was more than a squall. And the wind was from north
until six in the morning. Accordingly we went south and did less progress
towards StLucia than we would have liked. Just 100 nM last 24 hours.

Now we have bright sunshine, about 20 knots of wind, or sometimes down to
15. We are running under just the genoa. Not too fast. Eva bake bread, and
we make water. The watermaker shall run for three hour to day. That should
make approximately 100 l of water. Lunch in the cockpit is beeing prepared.

We have not seen much life in the water. There are many days since we saw a
dolphin. Except for flying fish we have seen vertually nothing. (Well, we
catced the dophin fish of course...)

The log tells us we have 13 hundreds something miles left to go, but it also
tells us that we now have made more than 6000 n. miles since we left
Blommenholm. Sometimes I really love the fact that once in the Caribbean,
the distances are short between the islands. I think I will love to wake up
in the morning in an anchorage, have a bath and then breakfast without
having to balance my plate and my coffee cup and keep an eye on the egg just
to catch it before it flies from the table. But life on a passage has its
charm too. Just 10 or 11 or 12 or 13 or... days to go!