December 7th 2010: Cod fish tongues and a new crew member
12:57.50N 36:38.8W And now, for something completely different… Seeing as though we had passed the trip’s
halfway mark, we decided to celebrate with a special meal. Though the four
Portuguese were familiar with one of their country’s delicacies, Boyan
had never heard of Arroz de Linguas de Bacalhau before the trip. Manuel Sr.
assured him that, though many outside of Though high quality food has come at a constant rate
during the trip, the same cannot be said of the wind. Slowly but surely,
however, weak winds are becoming the exception rather than the expectation. Our
arbitrary milewaves (in the absence of milestones)
are quickly disappearing behind the transom and the trade winds are reliably
pushing us to the West. This progress has seen the introduction of our sixth
team mate. He was behind the camera when yesterday’s photo was taken and,
as usual, was driving the boat without complaints. Ruminating a pair of Amps
from time to time, looking to the compass every three or four seconds and,
since yesterday, he is also taking into account the position of the windvane
and keeping a constant angle with the wind. The incoherence often found between
the two pieces of information, compass and wind direction, make him a little
bit angry (who wouldn't?), but he keeps his protests to a series of beeps. In
the beginning, these beeps caused concern among the senior crew members, but
are now totally ignored, in the knowledge that averaging for a little longer will
surely solve the problem. All these qualities, along with his modest behaviour,
make us proud to introduce to you the “Piloto Automático” (Auto
Pilot). In the absence of a more than deserved medal for relevant services, we
propose to give him the recognition of being referred to as “HE”, instead
of the inglorious “it”
under which he was born in the aseptic coldness of a (possibly Chinese)
factory. Unfortunately, he was not in the mood to celebrate by
eating Arroz de Linguas de Bacalhau. Instead, he stuck to his usual diet of
electricity – which was alright with us! Until next time, The Enigma Crew PS: For today, 7th December, happy
birthday to Maria Antónia (Manuel’s Mother) from the Enigma crew |