Location 39:17.81N 010:47.59W

 

Yesterday’s storms replaced today by F2 /3 winds with sunshine and the residual swell.

 

As apprehension turned to appreciation we went from 3 reef, to 2, to 1, full sail and finally flew the big symmetric spinnaker for a while.

Also a day for enjoying the sunshine and catching up on jobs.  The Worlds have washed, changed,and are fresh for the second half of the journey (yes – we are now over halfway there).  The Scrimshaws have – so far- deigned to conform and claim they will spruce themselves up later.

This morning our course was taking us on a rhumb line to Las Palmas, but as we put the kite up the wind backed we were forced back on a course towards the lighter winds of the Portuguese coast, so we doused the kite and gybed off, currently running under full main and poled out genoa, doing 6.5 knots in 13 kn of wind.

Positives – sunshine, good food and winds.  Hydrogenerator keeping up with our power needs (refrigerator, computer , TV

screen all on 24/7)  watermaker run for 4 hours today (when James eventually remembered that the flushing water did not come out the sampling tap but direct to drain – however we all found out a lot more about the boat’s plumbing system in a 60 minute period until he realised his mistake).  We have now replenished some of what we have used,

Negatives – mainly the Saildrive – but we are building a list of jobs for Las Palmas.