Atlantic Crossing - Day 6 - Wow! What a day...
The Talulah's Web Diary
Ali Pery / Shane Warriker
Tue 29 Jun 2010 20:11
Wow! What a day..
After a foggy but calm night, with white flares and fog horn to hand, this
morning the sun rose and burnt it all away.
It was gloriously warm, blue sky, clothes flung afar, and calm, calm, seas.
On the 12 o'clock SSB net we all gathered around the handset, shaking
Caribbean bean pods, playing harmonicas, and banging saucepan drums, and
sang Happy Birthday to Daria on "Aleria" (who were 23 miles due north of us,
on their way to Ireland).
We sat in the cockpit eating fried octopus, and watched whales blowing a
hundred metres away.
While Shane and Jon took sunsights with the sextant the best part of the
day, plotting our positions, Kate and Ali had a gin and tonic in the cockpit
and Kate gave Ali a mighty fine haircut.
At around 4pm we saw a sailboat on the horizon. Knowing that "Aleria" were
then heading our way to try and avoid the looming storm, we radioed through
on the VHF. And yes, it was them!
As we got closer and closer to each other, we saw another 2 whales blowing
and swimming, one of which took a big lungful of air and made a spectacular
dive showing off its very handsome tail fluke as it went.
We decided on a mid Altantic raft up with Aleria to celebrate Daria's
birthday in style.
We just had time to dress up in our best party outfits - Kate and Ali in
long frocks, and Shane and Jon in waistcoats.
Out came the fenders, and the lines, and despite a bit of a swell, we
managed to tie alongside each other and exchange some rum, birthday cake and
big hugs all round. Wow. Bear in mind this is mid Atlantic, and we haven't
seen another sailboat since we set off. And there we were alongside our
friends we first encountered just before our first Atlantic crossing.
We have changed course to the east to skirt around the bottom of the low
pressure system that is the storm north of us, and as we prepare for a bumpy
ride ahead, we are all amazed at how a day in the middle of the Atlantic
Ocean can turn out ...