La Contenta - Day 8: Calm is the Sea

 

We are in the doldrums.  We thought we would be ok if we kept above 25 degrees north but apparently not!  We have spent the day in sunshine reading, fishing (still no fish) and a stunning serenade at sunset from our on-board band; Dave on sax and Cal on guitar. 

 

The sunset was magnificent.  The clouds were lit up through almost 360 degrees around us, and as the colours faded we started to see lightening in the distance.  We watched this storm for a couple of hours.  It was too far away to hear any thunder but the lightening lit up the clouds every few seconds with a mix of sheet and fork lightening.  It made us glad that we weren’t too far north and our thoughts were with any boats sailing through it.  Its now night time and the skies have treated us to the clearest of heavens.  The milky way is magnificent tonight and we sat on the back of LC with a sense of awe and gratitude.  Calm is the sea.

 

Reflecting back, our first week has been a tale of two halves.  No wind and high wind.  To use an expression of a good friend of ours the wind has gone up and down like a brides nighty! On board I can see us becoming slightly more obsessed both both wind speed and with food.  Meal times are eagerly anticipated and tonight we were treated to a gourmet menu of haggis balls and Daves version of neeps and tatties.  The haggis was addressed in true Burns style by Ewen who is fluent in the first few verses and then adlibbed ....If my camera had been handy then Cals face at this address would have won prizes.  A wee dram toasting LC and her Scottish registration has seen that all crew are now snoring noisily.  They are la contenta!