Hi Guys,

So we left Albufeira at 0500 yesterday to little wind with Ciara and Brendan on first watch. However as soon as Clodagh and Brenda came on watch the wind picked up and soon we were flying along at up to 9 knots. Unfortunately while obviously the best sailors of the bunch, Clodagh and Brenda (henceforth referred to as the Dream Team) are not so good when it comes to technology of the camera variety, they were met by a fantastic and playful bunch of dolphins jumping around the bow of the boat but neither managed to capture the moment on film despite their best efforts. Also on board is Roisin, who as she will not be on ARC trip is very kindly opting out of the watch system to give us a chance to our feet – very kind!

Yesterday the wind stayed up for most of the day with 2m swell and lots of white caps, so the mainsail at the 2nd reefed in until 0600hrs this morning. All of yesterday we were using only the inner foresail and reefed main and doing between 7.5 and 9 knots for much part of the day. Around dinner time (Spagetti Bolagnaise after a special request submitted by the Dream Team) the generator stopped working, which was not ideal, however the problem rectified itself several hours later.

After nightfall the radio activity picked up, some of you may remember the infamous ‘Philipino Monkey’ of 2004, I believe he was back in action again, this time reincarnated into a radio DJ repeatedly playing the same song down the VHF with a commentary of ‘Louder Louder’ and ‘ One More’, amusing for a while…….!

The seas calmed about 2100hrs last night. We had a beautiful sail through the night with a full moon and steady breeze. We are now into Day 2 having had breakfast and music. Current Position is 35’31 N 11’43’ W, as of 10.23am Irish Time on the 24^th of July.  In our first 24 hours we covered 170nm’s approx. Update again tomorrow!

All on Yacht Wizard