Its a beautiful day
Balvenie
Mark Farrell & Amanda Church
Tue 20 Dec 2011 14:01
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Position at 1345GMT 17:24N 23:55W,
around 70 miles to run to Mindelo.
It seems we have finally peaked
Everest and have slid down the other side, getting stuck on a few of the
foothills now and again but now mainly cruising along in the lowlands. The
high winds and big seas have eased, we now have about 15 knots and less than 2
metre swell but she's a lumpy and rolly old ride until the seas flatten
more.
The Aussie boats must think we are having a race. Tactical
Directions tried breaking the multihull speed record yesterday, clocking 19
knots down a wave. Eye Candy went for the monohull record and
blasted down a wave hitting 13.9 knots. Balvenie has been much
more sensible topping at around 9 knots, she loves the big waves and just lifts
up and lets them pass under her. Despite our lack of record breaking we
are in the lead, much to skippers joy!!
We practised some more acrobatics
this morning, shed a few layers of thermals and fleeces and have almost got
"tropics" attire on. At last it is warming up. We have had sunshine
each day, but the wind had been very cool while it was strong, today is much
better.
Still havent deployed the fishing
line, can't face a bloody massacre on the deck if we happen to catch one - we
have plenty of food.
Last night was so dark, the waning
moon has waned to a point of being about as bright a a planet and and not
appearing until 3am, not much use at all. We saw a fishing boat
and container ship last night, the first traffic in
days.
Time for a nap, looking very forward
to dropping anchor in Mindelo around
dawn. |