Date: Tuesay 11th Dec 2012
Time: 12:30 UTC
Position: 15⁰ 28’.2 N 59⁰ 53’.2 W
SOG: 6- 8.5 knots
COG: 285 ⁰ M
Weather: Sun & Cloud
Wind: E-Ne 15-22 kts
Hello to all our followers,
Yesterday round noon we enjoyed an occasional spell of sun. The sky gradually cleared during the afternoon but new squall started to develop in the early evening. During the cooking of the potatoes wedges and chilli con carne we had to connect a new gas bottle. Galileo just had diner ready when the call was made to shut the hatches for a shower was approaching quickly. As it was awfully hot inside from the afternoon sun and the cooking on both gas rings and the oven the complete crew went outside for a quick eat looking at the nearby shower. Luckily the rain was limited to some drizzle and after that we did the dishes on the aft deck. With one hour to go from the afternoon watch John did half an hour of helming and Oscar the second. Just 15 minutes before the the turn of the watch to Sam’s team a small group of about ten dolphins popped up and played around the boat for about five minutes. And just as soon as the appeared they disappeared at once.
The night was a sort of farewell gift. We had predominantly clear skies above us with some low cumulus clouds or cumulo-stratus at the Easterly horizon and in the South. In the Northeast periodically a squall developed but they remained quite small and most of them passed behind us. Except one during Jacko’s team watch at the end of the night, so we started the day with the boat cleaned with fresh water. So we enjoyed the almost dry night with good progress, a lightly shifting E-NE wind of 20 to 26 knots with an occasional gust and a moderate sea state with a steep and annoying wave every now and then.
As the first day watch is about to take over, and Sunderland Niel just came out and set in the cockpit a flying fish landed behing him. Flapping intensively it managed to get into the cockpit around the wheel and struggled to get over the backstay trimming line. Just as we thought it was to exhausted to make it and Jacko was on his way to shove the fish overboard it succeeded and was gone. There seems to be a strange relationship between Sunderland and the flying fish as he perceived two encounters with them and a few near ones.
We all look forward to see land and especially to a nice shower and the bar. Each switch of watches we ask one another the same question: ‘ how many miles to go?’ The answer as I am typing this is: 128 miles to go. We adjusted the displays on the cockpit instruments so we can see our progress from the helm.
The weather is looking good and we hope to enjoy a quiet and sunny last day on the ocean and anticipate to finish in the early hours of the twelfth UT and hope that it will be late evening local time to get Ryan clipped on to the bar before his LT birthday starts.
Best regards from the Lancelot II crew