35:01N 55:18W Slow Progress under a sunny sky
The Snark on The ARC
Ben Little
Sun 15 May 2011 21:41
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Hi there folks,
another day of beautiful sunshine white fluffy
clouds and no wind. We got excited early on shortly after I arose, that we
would be able to sail and we had made it through the dead zone, however 30
minutes later and the engine was back on and with a quick look at the grib
weather report was less than encouraging reading. Looks like that extra
day in port awaiting our repaired sail cost us a much faster passage.
Still plagued by Portuguese man-o-war no-one
fancied a swim while we stopped the engine for an oil and coolant check.
The good news is that while we are running 1-2 knots slower than we might at
high cruising revs, a check on fuel consumption shows that we now have a range
of over 1000Nm, not enough to get us all the way but we will surely get a few
hundred miles of sailing between here and the Azores. It will be a long
passage if not and we are still quite a way from our half way
party!!
We are all getting through reading material at
a rapid rate and there is every chance I will run out before we get to Horta at
this rate. More time for writing this blog I guess, but for today there is
very little to report in the way of action. Quentin is complaining of
"seeing things" on the night shift while staring at the instruments and Chris is
hearing voices (and may even have had a whole conversation). At least
there is the opportunity to catch up on any sleep we may have missed in the
first 48 hours.
Bye for now looking forward to hearing from anyone
following us out there.
...Last minute excitement, we just had a man over
board drill in the sense that we collected someone's Dan Buoy (for the non
sailors reading this is a floating pole which helps mark the position of a
casualty in the water), it was clearly very old judging by the number of sea
creatures growing on it and there was no-one attached. Now the sun is
setting so I doubt we shall see any more thrills this evening.
Ben and the Crew of The Snark
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