35 53N 05 17W
Osprey
John Bowering
Mon 22 Jun 2009 19:41
However, Captain Budda ekked every last drop of speed out of Osprey, and in a piece of audacious navigating took us to the very edge of the traffic separation zone, not strictly speaking in line with the IMO as this was not the inshore lane - this allowed us to make the maximum of the strong current running through the Straits, acheiving 10 knots speed over the ground. So from 1430 hrs onwards we really began to make progress, and as I write this the sun is sinking over Cueto and we have a mere 10 nm to go to Smir.
The last 24 hrs have been somewhat fun, with us in amongst the shipping lanes playing that age old childrens game - Chicken. Lets just say, it is fun to a point but when facing down a Maersk Line container ship it is liable to give you heart palputations!
For the past hour we have made numerous sitings of Dolphins, large and small. With two particularly frisky ones putting on quite a display, performing sychronised high jumps just off our starboard beam.
So as the sun sets on SY Osprey it is with a sense of acheivement, amusement at all the little incidents that have taken place and a certain amount of relief at being on the final approach that the motley crew can look back on the experience of an Atlantic crossing the hardway, with terrible winds but certainly an adventure!