One day in.
Rhiann Marie - Round the World
Stewart Graham
Sat 18 Jun 2011 05:20
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Saturday 18th June 2011 0853 Local (Mauritius) Time
0453 UTC
22:15.12S 052:57.06E
We have decided due to the severe low pressures
passing through and the advice to avoid the south of Madagascar in all but
emergency circumstances, to head for a waypoint about 100 miles south of Cap
Saint Marie. The waypoint is 510 miles away in position is 27:10.166S
045:17.281E and our ETA there is currently midnight Monday night / Tuesday
morning.
All is well on board and we are settled into our
watch patterns now. I am on Midnight to 0400 Craig is on 0400 - 0800 and
four on four off 24 / 7 like that. This may seem hard going but compared to
what I have been doing it is a real treat for me to get so much horizontal
time.
Cooking is my responsibility and cleaning up
is Craigs. It is great to have him with me and though we expect a tough
ride we are extremely fortunate to be able to spend this time together on this
part of the adventure. Craig visited us last in Tonga and before that was aboard
the boat from the start for five months leaving to go home in May 2010 from the
Carribean.
What a difference a year can make! He did very well
with us previuosly crossing Biscay and the Atlantic, cruising the
Caribean and sailing about 7,000 miles altogether. His maturity and
attitude now remind of a quote by Mark Twain which goes (something
like) "when I was 14 my father knew nothing - I was amazed how much he had
learned by the time I was 21".
It truly is a privelige to be fortunate to spend
this time together and watch your own son mature into a man. I am also fortunate
to be able to count Craig and his sister Rhiann among my friends as well as
son and daughter.
Of course the minute he sleeps in for the first
watch all this praise will evapourate and I will also report back to you aftewr
what looks like being an eight or nine day passage!
We had a slow day yesterday with between 12 and 15
knots at 150 degrees and though we could have changed sailplan through the
night we decided to have a comfortable night and toddled along at just over 6
knots and will have made just 165 miles for the day. Very poor by our
standards. The fact is however it suits us to be a little slower going
southwest at the moment to let the first big low pass underneath to the south of
us. We will try to do better but we are faced with a 24 hour beat into 20 knots
of wind later today.
Apparently it is fathers day tomorrow. I am looking
forward to scrambled eggs and bacon in bed delivered with the Sunday Times, but
not till next year.
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