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Anika - BLOG DAY 11



I am in trouble for not blogging since we left Las Palmas at the begining of the ARC 2014!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Anyway better late than never.
We were hugely appreciative of the support of family and friends who took the time to come out to Gran Canaria to see us off you will never know what that meant.
If you have been looking at the Fleet Viewer positions you may be forgiven for thinking that Simon had mutinied locked the skipper below and was heading home to New Zealand as we went due south and only 71 nm off Mauritania the African coast when we finally headed west passing 320 nm nort west of the Capr Verdes Islands - it might have had something to do with someone asking how far out into the Atlantic did pirates come - or maybe it was just a judgment call to go south with the wind rather than pretty much due west and heavier seas.
The winds are what have dictated our course and course changes to date which coincidentally follow the southern trade wind route pretty closely. For the first few days we had good sailing in fresh conditions with reasonable atlantic swells rolling through a lot of cloud and some rain or occassional squalls. Duncan (Hydrovane)repeatedly  receives accolades for his handling of our steering all conditions so far and is genuinely a fourth  member of crew and does not need feeding or walking, quite unlike our chocolate brown labrador which the Hydrovane is named after. Then we had very fickle wind directions and speeds, very frustrating, 3rd December was sunny but very light winds but made reasonable progress whilst today the 4th is sunny with great sailing winds ESE 15 to 20 knots. 
With the ability to make water and run a generator it has made a huge impact on the quality of life onboard - hot showers when ever you want is lovely, unless you are like two of the crew who seem to prefer through a bucket of water over their heads to wet themselves before lathering and then two or three more buckets of water to rinse before a fresh water flush from the deck solar shower. Now if I can get them to do this on a different part of the deck each day then maybe I can get the decks cleaned without any complaining?! 
FOOD
Having eaten so well before our departure as a highly unskilled kitchen person I was more worried about this aspect than the actual passage across an ocean. I need not have worried despite very rolly polly seas a substantial stew put together by Pip (Simon's wife) went down well and stayed down! The cake with brandy once unpacked was devoured despite exercising huge restraint - it must have been the prospect of the brandy having had NO alcohol for eight days at this point, well done Pip.
Both Simon and Richard are highly qualified and creative cooks with bread, muffins, stir fries and the highlight MAHI MAHI (dorado). Richard has caught two so far each a nice size to provide good meals, so the only dissapointment for them was when I made a salad one evening, steak another and then for the first time in my life cooked chicken - it's ok, it was days ago and we are still alive.
Sealife I will cover in my next blog so for now we are happy, healthy and enjoying the adventure enhanced by the mix of quality skills between the three of us.
 
David

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