Calypso's Web Diary
Joe Drury
Sat 25 Jun 2011 10:02
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Good morning all,
Poor Alex is absolutely fast asleep after the poor
thing had the double watch last night, the wind slackened off overnight but we
still managed 50 miles before 9 o'clock. Sad news that we are bringing up the
rear but with our reefing and spinnaker problems we can't push her any harder.
Slow and steady doesn't necessarily mean "wins the race" but at least we can be
assured a place if we keep up the steady progress, not to mention arriving
safely into Falmouth with crew and boat intact.
We have 744 miles to run, by my count, around 6
days left. The weather is set to change this afternoon, so I hope we can
continue our path to the NE.
Breakfast for me was lovely, I had tea and a cheese
and ham toastie, and took it in the cockpit in the sunshine! Sorry about the
foul weather you guys are having (ha ha) but at least you don't have the worry
that the weather may capsize your house in the night! We are tracking a low that
is sweeping in from the west, hopefully this will aid us rather than hinder us,
but it is a bit too early to see what shape it will take or how big it will be.
We had 2 encounters yesterday from huge tankers,
the first was when I was on deck wrestling with the sails, a big cargo container
ship came within 2 miles, then at 2300 the dradis alarm went off and the AIS
went mad, we were watching a film at the time (another Doris Day...) and we
jumped out of our skin to see a 300m oil tanker materialise out of the gloomy
night and slip down our starboard side, a mile and a half off our beam. I was
pleased that all our alarms work to protect us, although it is still a
rather unpleasant experience when they creep up on you like that. They come on
quick, we'd only just had a lookout!
Today's jobs are to tidy the galley and saloon
areas, and affect minor repairs to the rigging. It is too rough for me to climb
the mast, so that can wait (good). It needs doing though, if we hit bad weather
without the ability to shorten sail it could develop into a very boring
situation indeed.
Okay, enough babble from me, Alex will check in
with you all this afternoon when she gets up, bless her!
Joe
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