Little Island - 288-312 hours

We’re over half way! By now, easily over it. The chart plotter gives an estimate of arrival based on current speeds and it’s incredibly difficult not to look every so often, although the result is often slightly disappointing. My favourite game is to see how early I can get it to read, usually in a big gust after surging down a couple of waves. Last night it said the 11th at one stage, but just for a second. Realistically we’re looking at something like 16th.

The sea state remains messy with a surprisingly short wave period of around six seconds. As a result, it’s hard to push it with the sail choice because the apparent wind is so disturbed in the relentless yawing and lurching. Instead, we’ve just settled on the genoa only option, satisfied with a consistent 5.5-6.2 knots through the water. It’s not worth the extra concentration or risk to try and push for the extra point few of a knot we’d potentially achieve.

In these conditions, shower time has become a bit more exciting. Previously we’d happily be holding up the solar shower for one another, merrily washing ourselves down in the tropical sunshine. It was almost elegant, but not too so - it could probably pass for a Herbal Essences advert. Now the story is totally different. It’s like a navy seal exercise initially. “3,2,1...DUNK. DUNK. DUNK.” Then it’s a frantic rush to get the soap on. At this stage, all military precision goes out the window and instead we become a mess of body parts slipping and sliding all over the place, like Bambi on ice, clinging on to anything we can for stability. The cockpit becomes a literal soap dish. Shower time is almost certainly the most dangerous part of the trip.

I got interrupted writing this yesterday afternoon, so I join in here to include 336 hours. I was interrupted by some monstrous rain clouds and called Cat up to get the boat ready for a wild ride. We braced ourselves, waiting for the wall of rain to move in, gripping the wheel tight and expecting huge winds to hit us any second. Turns out, we’d built it up a lot in our heads and all it did was rain - a lot. Not much extra wind, just two soaking wet, miserable crew members. We put the bimini up the other day to add a bit of rain protection, but unfortunately all that does is channel the rain into an irritatingly perfect waterfall that falls directly down the neck of the helmsman.

Through the night we continued to deal with lots of rain and some decent sized squalls. Cat did a great job steering the boat through probably the biggest winds we’ve had so far and has the highest speed to her name. At one time she blew the whistle at the helm (allegedly it took a minute of it to wake me), so like a good crew member (or a good dog), I promptly, or so I thought, hopped out of bed and reported to deck for duty. Scrambling out of the companionway in the nude, I hopped over the the winch slightly sleepy eyed and disorientated ready to do my duty. It was wet, cold and terribly unpleasant. At that point, as squalls do, the wind retreated with the same suddenness as it came and I was in an instant, redundant. Damp, naked, sleep-deprived and now also totally useless!

I’ve just woken up to find another boat two miles away. It’s Santosha too - our neighbours from the marina in Las Palmas. It’s funny how boats occasionally come together after so many miles of sailing with an infinite number of angle choices and routes. Unfortunately they’re catching us up and, like our friends Gitane, will probably proceed to pass us and get the best pick of the rum punch in St Lucia. Like I said earlier, we could probably go quicker but the effort and risk isn’t worth it. It pains to me accept less than the best speed we can get, especially when you can see boats overtaking! Now we’re in the trades properly, most boats are just sailing at around 70-80% of hull speed. We’re doing the same, but our hull speed is slower so inevitably we’ll slide down the position list until we arrive.

We’re not too sad about it. I’d say we’re relishing the challenge, especially as a tiny team of two. It would be nice to get there faster, but simply getting there is the goal.

Martin