Surrounded
Rhiann Marie - Round the World
Stewart Graham
Sat 28 Nov 2009 17:10
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Today at 1400 we are at 16:21.64N 044:44.8W and we
are surrounded by empty horizons, and have been for many many days now. The last
day was the biggest run we have had to date with a single 4 hour watch (Craig
& Murdo's) turning in 41 miles. The daily run was 236 miles and for the
moment the 240 mile day still eludes us and will until we have some free wind.
Since our departure from Gran Canaria I dont
believe we have had a single time when we have had free wind and we have only
had a day and a half when we could actually point at our waypoint though we
were still tight down wind and not freed. Surely we can have one day before
we arrive when we can sail our course freely.
Our ETA for Antigua is now Saturday 5th
December a day later than we originally planned. We are not fishing as we are
sailing too fast (between 9 and 10 knots normally). However the flying fish have
turned into kamikaze's and one landed last night under the sprayhood inside the
cockpit - a leap of about 2m high and 4m long - quite impressive!
Tonight is Saturday night so we are all going down
to the pub. There is a curry and quiz night on with volunteer mixed DJ's. We
will finish the evening we think with a traditional punch up at closing
time................. This will inevitably be over the much interpreted and
re-interpreted sailing statistics. Speaking of which we have now done 8 200
mile plus days in a row! A total of 1777 miles sailed. Seven of these days were
after we turned west from our Cape verde waypoint. For these seven days we
sailed 1575 miles and made 1155 towards our Antigua waypoint. Can we do TEN
200 milers in a row?
Assuming there are no arrests tonight after our
night in the pub we will speak tomorrow.
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