March 7th
Threeships
Shaun and Ainur Weaver
Sat 7 Mar 2015 14:11
1400 GMT
07 52S 014 30W
We left Ascension island at 1230 today and are now heading for the equator
and the NE trades. We have just over 3000 miles to go to Grenada. Ascension was
a weird but interesting island. Nice volcanic scenery with lush cloud forest
above 2400 feet where a good view is a rarity. The strangest thing was seeing so
few people about – we visited the ‘airhead’ ( airport) to see if we could get
some weather info. and there was this huge sophisticated passenger terminal –
and no people until we finally spotted a lone figure wandering out towards the
runway and he gave us directions, which was appropriate since he was the
director of operations. Then there are the antenna – sitting there listening –
and the BBC World service relay station which transmits to Africa – but they
couldn’t tell us how we could pick up a news broadcast, they just monitored the
water temperature of the transmitters and changed capacitors! The internet
provided by Sure sure was unsecured – never had so many spam emails, the bank
charges were still extortionate and getting a decent cup of coffee was
impossible – except on board Threeships. But we loved it and the steaks at the
American airbase were good and cheap. So all well on board and we’ll be posting
position reports every 2 days to save iridium
time. |