Thursday 8th June: Election Day
Awelina of Sweden
James Collier
Thu 8 Jun 2017 14:39
Reefing and gybing at midnight seems to have become a theme as we had to do it again last night while it poured with rain. But by 5am the wind had abated and we put the yankee back, poled out to stbd, and by mid morning it became sunny and very pleasant in a SW F5 to 6. According to the shipping forecasts it should remain so until Saturday morning when it will get a lot windier.
Also around 5am we crossed the edge of the continental shelf and the echo sounder suddenly started reading again (about 140m). The waves also grew smaller as the very long oceanic waves are stopped. We have <130 miles to go to the Lizard and thus expect to be there in about 20 hours (so around 10am). Bread making today, the last of the voyage, and coleslaw from the last carrot. Cabbages, onions and potatoes are holding out well.
But of course many things could go wrong so we can’t count on it. One thing which has is a ball-bearing race in the steering; the one at the bottom of the vertical shaft in the pedestal to which the wheel is attached. It has disintegrated and now has lots of play and makes clunking noises. We found out about it however because it leaked a bit - only a few spoonfuls - of rusty and oily water onto the bed in the aft cabin. One more minor thing to fix in port.
Radio 4 is now coming through, so we’ll probably get election results earlier than everyone else (a pretty minor advantage of staying up all night on watch).
Good luck and good riding to Peter on the John O’ Groats to Land’s End ride. I hope it goes well (and good luck to Plum - driving the support is nearly as hard and much more stressful I’m sure!).