At 06:00 a train of waves came charging up behind the boat. Suddenly, this 30 ton, long keel, wing on wing rigged sailboat became a giant surfboard. We had two full reefs in the Genoa, three reefs tucked in the main, and the full, tight mid-line staysail up. We skittered sideways like a car out of control on ice, heeled way over until the Genoa’s pole almost kissed the water, and for a moment I was really, truly frightened that we were going to broach, but the wave slid out from under us, raising up like a mountain off our bow, and somehow, we straightened up after rocking side to side a couple moments. By 07:30 the big waves were done, and we had a really lovely sail the rest of the day. It only rained lightly once all day, unlike the torrential downpours every hour of the past five days. We read voraciously; I finished James Clavell’s ‘Whirlwind’, and Captain ploughed through a James Patterson thriller, ‘Where the Wind Blows’. Funny how we each chose a book with wind in the title! ( sailors...we can’t get enough of the wind...!) The sailing was very good all day, and at 22:00 we passed north of Rodriquez island, and began to “see the light at the end of the tunnel”. A cargo ship passed us, and we verified that our AIS is not working...another project for the Mauritius list. Hopefully just a couple more nights and we will be there, and able to start addressing all our equipment issues.
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