Our first full day back at sea, and a wonderful, if double faceted, day.
On the one hand we have immediately settled into our watch pattern well, and happily back into life on the ocean wave. The temperature has been in the upper twenties. There is wall to wall bright sunshine under a blue sky. We are skimming across a slight deep blue ocean. We only have a light wind though, only just enough to keep us going, and the boat motion is quite gentle. So all is good, if a bit slow, with us in our serene blue world. The auto pilot is handling the boat well and we have been able to get on with some other things. David is relishing the end of boat preparations and has enjoyed reading a book. I have progressed my Atlantic Project of making a quilt for our bed by sewing on old courtesy flags.
On the other hand we are not quite going in the correct direction! Overall our passage is from 16 degrees north to 12 degrees north. It is also from 25 degrees west to 61 degrees west, which is huge. That’s difficult to get our heads around as we are not used to higher numbers for the longitude than the latitude. So, whilst we are going four degrees further south, due to the rhumb line being 2,174 miles long, our direct course is almost due west (267 degrees). Pointing as high as we can satisfactorily sail under full genoa and ballooner we are sailing south westish - the wind is blowing NE at best, but, worse than that, often swinging more north. So, us boats that went south are falling to the back of the fleet. We have of course debated what to do. The grib files still, to us, make it look like there is more wind to the south of the line. They also show that the Trade Winds are going to go into the east, in due course, as they are supposed to do. So we have continued as is, at least for today, lazily enjoying a lovely sail.
As darkness fell the winds increased and were for a while in the upper teens. The direction also started oscillating with the winds shifting more to the east, and staying there for longer, before they go back into the north east. The auto pilot is on wind setting and so picking up these shifts nicely. But it does need manual adjustment quite often with the shifty winds because we are sailing on the limit of our sail plan, especially as the gusts change the apparent wind more. Nice when we get towards, and actually on, our proper course, and the time on that increases in length. Frustrating when we head more south again and away from our line.
Over night our chart plotter track has shown a gentle curve, so we are beginning to get on course. Maybe the butter is now melting. Tomorrow will be key.