La Cigale - Day 7 - 25 November - Wonders of the Sea

Dawn watch this morning, wondering at the miracle of the sunrise. Meanwhile next to me at the helm sat Francis, still suffering after a particularly choppy night, who was wondering "Why did God create seasickness Mum?"

We are now coasting along on south-westerlies, heading South towards the trade winds, hopefully joining them in a couple of days. We are being pushed a bit too much to the (South) East, so it feels like two steps forward and one step back, but we are under sail, the sun is shining and we are charging along.

The highlight of the day was the appearance of a pod of dolphins at dusk. From the stern at first it was rather dramatic seeing a wall of water rush towards us and catch a glimpse of a couple of grey bullets speeding through. Then, all of us clipped on with our lifelines at the bow, we could watch the dolphins close up - they seem larger than the ones we are used to sailing to the Canaries, and backflips in their acrobatics revealed a cream and mottled underbelly we hadn't seen before. Just as it felt life couldn't be any more perfect, we got drenched by a rogue wave. Not enough to dampen our spirits, but time to call it a day.