POSITION REPORT ON MONDAY 26 FEBRUARY 2018 AT 0700

14:45S 09:33W

So far we've done 235 miles with 1,565 miles to go to Jacaré, Brazil. We did 125 miles in the last 24 hours.  We have 20% cloud cover and 8-12 knot SSE winds.  We’re sailing wing-on-wing doing 5 knots with a 1 metre swell. Here's what we did yesterday and overnight.

25 February 2018   St Helena to Brazil (Day 2)

The pleasant weather continued after dawn - we had scattered clouds and 8-14 knot winds allowing us to sail at 5 to 6 knots. At our 07:00 position check, we’d sailed 105 miles in 21 hours, which is a average of 5 knots – better than I first thought.

In the morning, we passed by a Brown Noddy resting on a small log.  As soon as our fishing lures were level with the flotsam, an 18lb Dorado took the popper lure on the rod.  It took me 20 minutes to haul it in and gaff it onto our aft deck.  We put a towel over its head to stop it flailing around; splashed a bit of cheap rum in the gills; and it was dead within a few minutes without too much blood and gore.

I then spent 25 minutes gutting and filleting the beast while we rolled along at 6 knots in 2 metres seas.  Unsurprisingly, we had fried Dorado sandwiches for lunch and Dorado in Creamy Sauce with mashed potatoes for dinner.

We had consistent 8-14 knot winds for most of the day and racked up a fair few miles, but the wind became a little fickle after dark, dropping to as low as 5 knots for some of the time.  Unfortunately, we still had 1½ metre seas, so during the lulls, we were being rolled about, causing our sails to bang and slat around as we drifted along at 2 to 3 knots – very frustrating.  The lulls seemed to be caused by cloud banks passing us by, but they didn’t last more than an hour.

During Glenys’ 10-1 watch, we picked up a hitch-hiker – a small Brown Noddy took a liking to our solar panels and took a chance on a landing in the moonlight.