What has happen so far "52:01.72 06:02.27W"
The adventures of Skipper Splodge and mack
Ian Cheek
Sun 23 May 2010 11:59
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The weather.
We had a nice sail under spinnaker, but had to
change course, and come up on the wind to avoid Sarn Badrig, or our trip would
have been a bit sorter than planned. Or we would have parked, and had to pretend
we planned to clean the hull. Sailed into the night, but by midnight the wind
had gone completely, and we had to admit defeat and start the engine. back under
sail by 11am this morning, but it looks like it will be short lived as the wind
has had it's morning run, and now we are drifting again.
Nature.
So far we have seen a seal, just floating on the
surface sun bathing, a couple of porpoises, and this morning we had the best
sight of all. A whale, it was to far away for a photo, but we could just see the
dark shape come out of the water then the white of the water as it splashed back
into the sea.
Technology
The iridium phone has been playing up, but seem to
have it working at the mo.
The one advantage of the Engine running last night
was the heating was on, and kept the cabin nice and warm for the sleeping off
watch crew. the heating consists of a bilge blower over a landrover
heatexchanger from the heating fan, but seems to be working well.
The engine bay blower also worked well, and
provided a handwarmer on deck, as you could cup your hands on the
outlet.
Strategy
Not wanting to have to deal with the TSS off Tuskar
Rock, we stayed off shore to avoid all the big ships. Only to find that was what
all the big ships were doing, so we had a mad hour dodging tankers. At 0950 we
had to use the DSC to contact the container ship Cepheus, and let him know we
were 3 miles on his bow, he said he had seen us, but I'm not sure, but he did
move and passed us down our port side, not quite close enough to see what he was
watching on the TV. Then we had to move to avoid being run down by Samskip
Express who was on our port bow. So after all that time for a cup of t and some
jelly babies.
Communications
Second morning we have talked to Vulcan Spirit up
in Scotland on the SSB, so think this might be a regular meeting on 4142khz at
0900 local.
Food
John cooked a good Chicken strew last night, and
tried to poison Ian with vegetable, and is back in the galley putting spinach
into an omelette, which again I think Ian will notice.
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