Someones Knocking At The Door ~ Day 5/6/Panama - Galapagos
Balvenie
Mark Farrell & Amanda Church
Mon 22 Jun 2015 15:32
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Position at 0945 local 1445 UTC 00
00.77N 086 45W 22 June
WE ARE RUNNING ALONG THE EQUATOR
COG 245degrees SOG 8knots Double Reefed
Main, Reefed Gib, True Wind 14 knots still just in front of the beam, 2 metre
swell
Sunny Skies now, 4 booby birds on the bow, oh ~
here comes another squall!!!!
24 hour run 0830 - 0830 was 156 miles.
The days are all melting into each other
somewhat, conditions yesterday were somewhat lively.
Quite alot to report,
starting with maybe two days ago (could have been three) we were overflown
mid afternoon by an AWACS aircraft with a big satellite dish on top, they did a
very low flyover and made a good attempt at trimming the top of our mast
off. Conditions in the
afternoon were ok, hard on the wind but about 10 knots so not bad and we were
almost laying our course for San Cristobal in the
Galapagos.
The heavy clouds formed again at dusk and squalls
showed all around us on the radar. Then I saw lights of a boat, we
wondered whether someone was coming to do a drugs inspection after the flyby,
who else would be out here without radar, as nothing was showing up, but maybe it was lost in the squalls. We were
both below tidying up for night time when we saw lights shining on us and heard
an engine and voices. But no, this was no drugs bust, just 2 men in an
open wooden fishing boat about 25 feet long and they had swung by to say hello
and to show us their catch of enormous fish, maybe mahi mahi or tuna but bigger
than us, almost the lenghth of their boat.
Of course this meant they brought their boat VERY
close alongside, we had a good sea running and one wave came up between
the boats and bounced off them and we got the most saltwater in the cockpit we
have ever had, they thought it was hilarious, guess they get drenched by waves
the whole time ~ we do not!! So off they went then turned round and
came straight back, this time they asked for water and we threw them a gallon
bottle we had in the saloon but he came too close to get it, another wave came
through and they hit the boat, profuse apologises and he gunned it to get away
but we expect we will have a scar alongside to show of our
visit!
We were 400 miles offshore and there was actually a small fleet of about 6 of them, guess there was a mother ship too. Shortly after the squalls started hitting and we rolled up the gib and drifted around for the next few hours, happy to have the lights of the fishing boats as company. When the wind returned it had changed direction
directly out of the south south west, straight where we wanted to go, at this
point we had 361 miles to the top of San Cristobal but we needed to tack away
south east, to be able to sail and get some southing in. The wind was forecast
to come around to the south and build so we needed to get as south as far
as we could to make the next few days as comfortable as we
could.
17 hours later when we tacked back we had 368 miles
to go, skipper and admiral were quite despondant but we had acheived a much
better position. We had a good sail on the new tack all day, always
as hard on the wind as was comfortable, cloudy skies all day, heavy cloud
cover at night, the moon was visable for about 10 minutes one night, the only
time we have seen it so far since leaving Colon
That will do for now, I am going cross eyed and we
are almost in the southern hemisphere, best get ready with camera. Life
onboard is improving
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