Monday 26 January 2015 (blog delayed due to satphone having a hissy fit)*

 

Going west, we are now on Nuuk (Greenland) time, GMT-3 hours

 

To start with, a return to Culture Corner.  Here is verse 2 of probably the best known, and maybe the best poem about sailing the sea:

 

 

                                         John Masefield “Sea-fever” v.2

 

The wind is mostly dead astern of us, so we are running goosewinged at night and yesterday in the daytime ran with the blue and white asymmetric spinnaker. (There are pictures of the various sails on the blog postings in January 2013)

 

Night running is getting smoother; only a few days ago sleep involved bracing oneself against woodwork and struggling to nod off.    The sea is reasonably flat at the moment.

 

Most of the time we are trailing a fishing line.  Every now and then there is a squawk from the reel and everyone leaps up to do fishing stuff.  In my case, heroically taking a picture if there is a catch, but I have wielded the gaff;  the heavy lifting is however done by Ben S and Mark who are naturals at the Hemingway stuff.    The latest beast to be plucked from the sea was even bigger than before, and was landed onto the bathing platform at the stern.  It has now been deftly filleted by Teresa – half is in the freezer and the other half is for lunch today.

 

 

(Mark doing the fisherman con-trick thing of holding it with outstretched arms, but it was a biggie anyway)

 

Talking of bathing, some of us have been yearning to have a swim in 4 mile deep water; yesterday this would have been possible during a slack wind period, but the spinnaker was up and swimming from a boat with a giant wind sock is not a good idea, even with lines trailing.

 

Utilities news – tragically we are down to our last roll of kitchen towel, but we are still OK for loo rolls (otherwise I would have to walk the plank).  Also, we are down to the last Fairy liquid bottle – the label says “11 weeks without buying another one”; rubbish, we have had it open for just a few days.   What are these people washing – expresso cups?

 

Since just after dawn on Monday we have had a tropicbird circling the boat, gradually getting closer and closer.  We thought it might be knackered and was looking for a place to kip, but current thinking is that it is looking for fish disturbed by our passage through the water.  Here are some Attenborough-standard shots by Ben D, and one by Teresa of Glenn having a long hard look at the sails and birdie doing another lap.

 

 

 

 

And a special hello to East Sussex – Simone, Mark, Holly, Max, Eleanor

 

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* as Oli mentioned in his posts, we lost the satphone for the rest of the voyage; I continued writing blogs and am now posting them all from Catamaran Marina in Falmouth Harbour after our arrival – indeed, a couple of days after as the shore wifi was pretty marginal.  Sorry about the hiatus, folks, and thanks for staying with us.