Another beautiful sunrise – we are almost into Day 13 of our
adventure.
Happy St Nicholas Day to children everywhere. Although not celebrated in
the UK, the Belgian and Polish crew are visibly excited at the arrival of Saint
Nick’s Day. If they have been good boys over the past 12 months then Santa Claus
(Sinta Klaus?) might just be trekking out to the middle of the North Atlantic to
give them a gift. Apparently, SC has paid a visit to Yv and JH but the rest of
us have clearly been too naughty.
I wonder if the aquatic SC uses reindeers and sleigh or rides on the backs
of dolphins? Speaking of which, we have seen any for three days now. In fact
very little wildlife except for the odd flying fish. Though Darek caught a huge
mahi mahi yesterday.
We are all in good spirits (even those that SC has chosen to ignore) and
are looking forward with keen anticipation to our arrival in St. Lucia. I hear
that the first ARC boats have arrived (congratulations to Caro) and we hope to
be downing the rum punches with you in a few days.
We are still suffering from light winds – which doesnt show Blue Ocean at
her best – but continuing to run 24/7 under spinnaker in an attempt to hold our
pole position in the multihull class. Thankfully, the autopilot is now working
reliably and we are spared the burden of hand steering although we still need to
have three people on watch in case the spinnaker needs attention (it is very
unstable in the lighter winds). Our motoring hours are low - despite the
light winds – which should help in the final ranking.
We crossed the symbolic 1,000nm barrier early this morning and, as I write,
we have 940nm to go.
The quality of the cuisine aboard Blue Ocean continues to astound with
excellent food again yesterday. Though Yellow Watch (it is our turn today) cant
hope to match the quality of the main meals (we blame our dwindling supplies
rather than our abilities) we still lead in the breakfast stakes; pancakes,
fresh bread and today warm cinnamon rolls.
Fairs winds to all,
Craig