Quick update - Festina arrived in Horta early this morning…

We are still engaged in our private battle of wits with Neptune. We decided the wind would veer ,so headed off on a long port tack , went on to starboard well short of the layline - classic upwind tactics even if the layline in question was 100 miles long. I have to admit to a small smirk as the shift gradually came through , lifting us up to our course for Horta over night , but of course Neptune has got his own back – literally – as the wind has backed again and we are 25 degrees low. On the positive side there is more wind than forecast and we are whooshing along at maximum upwind speed with 55.5 miles to go (( there’s one for Bryony!).

Life got even busier out here yesterday afternoon. As Lynda handed over to me she pointed out two yachts on the horizon. At that moment the VHF crackled into life calling “the yacht at such and such position” , which turned out to be us! It appeared that one yacht was towing the other , having come out from Horta to effect a salvage on a 56 footer with a broken forestay , no rudder and no clutch. Ouch ! The salvage vessel only had VHF for communication and wished us to report them to the Coastguard authorities and give an expected ETA. And no they didn’t want any other help ( they were EXTREMELY firm about this!) from which I gathered that this would be a case for the salvage court. It turned out that the towed vessel was the Spaniard we had heard earlier that nobody could understand. He was bound from Cuba to Barcelona so must have tangled with the same system that poor old Roy Boughton in Guiding Light had run into. It makes our almost universally light wind passage seem very fortunate.

When sailing upwind with a good heel , the sight of water racing past the gunwhale seen through the lee cabin windows is an impressive one. This morning I was sat inside trying to wake up when the whole window was filled by the extraordinary vision of an airborne dolphin flashing by , just inches away , to muscle in on the crowd riding the bow wave. The effect was spine tingling and plays in my head even now , although with each repetition it gets less distinct . If I need consolation , I just have to watch the surrounding seas for 15 minutes and can guarantee to see more of his kin , albeit not in such unexpected proximity. Our ambition is to see a Cachelot or Sperm whale. The books say they are around at this time of year so I better get back on deck and practise my “Thar she blows” !

Noon today ( 1300 UT ) sees us at 38 41N 29 51W and hoping to be in Horta some time in the wee small hours of tomorrow morning. All well!

Well , Neptune has thrown down the gauntlet and directed the wind to blow direct from Horta. Just to prove a point he has thrown in a bit of leeward going tide as well but all he has achieved is to put us on our mettle and we have shifted to upwind racing mode. The wind is varying by 30 degrees and we have yet to work out if there is a predictable shift on the way , so we are treating it as an oscillating wind and tacking on the shifts. With 160 miles to go that will probably be a lot of tacks unless the next weather download shows a predictable shift that will enable us to bang a corner.

Its getting pretty crowded around here! At present I can see 2 yachts , one is I think a French catamaran , and the other a Norwegian Swan, both motoring. Within 20 miles must be another Norwegian and a Swede who left Bermuda 6 days before us as we can hear them clearly on the VHF, plus a lonely Spaniard who doesn’t speak English or French and who therefore cannot join in the conversations. This is an extraordinary state of affairs as even in small bits of water like the Channel you lose sight of people very quickly , so out here there must be an extraordinary number of boats converging on the Azores for it to appear so crowded. The French cat has come from Guadeloupe but all the others have I think come from Bermuda. As I write we are surrounded by about 50 common dolphins making it even busier.

The cooker is falling apart again. We have rebuilt it from time to time with bits of Stainless steel sheet and wherever we stop next we need to have another go. The log reads 20 miles short of 10,000 miles since we set out , so plenty of bits and pieces are in a similar state of needing care and attention. Despite this Lynda has emerged triumphantly with a superb hot loaf which we will attack for lunch. Our position today at local noon ( 1300UT) is 38 41N 32 06 W, a crowded bit of ocean , and Festina and her crew are in good spirits. All well.

A much nicer day today with sun and the kind of cumulus streets that I associate with a nice force 4 on a summers day. Except we don’t have the force 4! The wind is mostly around 4 knots , and frequently blowing straight from Horta , but every so often it pulls round into the SE and increases and we potter along at 4 knots for a while before the engine , bless its cotton socks , has to go on again. The sailing is mostly on the wind , and as for some reason the water is quite lumpy we are set up with huge amounts of twist and fat angles to eke out the best possible speed. The windvane is not happy at these low wind speeds so we have used the autopilot for several days now. It is a remarkable bit of kit and will follow the fluctuating wind wonderfully well . Very sensibly it has been programmed to sound an alarm if the wind changes , and as this happens every few minutes we are constantly scurrying to cancel the alarms. Going to the heads was a bit of an issue as invariably just as you got settled the wretched thing would start its shrill beep beep beeping , until we hit on the idea of taking the remote in with you , thus avoiding being caught short or waking the off watch crew.

If we wait 3 days we might get some wind , but the grib files change daily and I doubt it’s a certainty. The latest fuel audit showed we have enough for 50 hours slow motoring, and the GPS shows 62 hours to go at our present slow speed so fingers crossed for a bit more wind tomorrow.

Oddly enough , despite the anxiously awaited milestones early in the crossing , both Lynda and I really don’t mind how long it takes now as we are completely in to the rhythm of passage making and a day or two here or there seems of no consequence.

At 1300 GMT our position was 38 29N 34 07 W. All well.

Thursdays Child has far to go –343 miles anyway, which at our present 3 knots is going to take – well, a long time yet. The wind has been astonishingly flukey both in strength and direction leaving us the option of using a windvane and heading alternately to Carlisle then CapeTown but minimising the trimming required , or else sailing a compass course and adjusting sheets interminably. The night was quite wet and we wore full oilies and fleeces for the first time.
We have company ! Not only do we have fairly constant visitations from dolphins but there is a 42 foot Swan sailing just half a mile away. The father and son crew set off 3 days before us and have done so much motoring they are quite low on fuel. Every time we sail past they put their engine on and get ahead again so we have to be extra vigilant at night , especially when the showers reduce the visibility . Still its nice to have someone to chat to on the VHF. We can hear snippets of other conversations all around and I get the impression of a whole Armada held up by the high , trickling along just behind the weather front and imagine the ocean black with boats as we near Horta and converge.
Despite the cold and wet , Lynda had a magical experience last night . For once the wind was being kind and she was racing along completely surrounded by so many dolphins it felt as if she were a hovercraft flying over the phosphorescent bubbles from their combined wakes. There is a high pitched squeak coming from the boom somewhere that sounds very like the squeaking noises they make when they are excited so perhaps there is communication of sorts going on without our knowledge.

Our position at 1400 UT was 38 42N 36 11W which I can recommend as a great place for dolphins, but somewhat hard to leave behind on account of there ‘aint much wind. However we are having a good time and all is well on Festina Lente.

The weather situation continues to be intriguing. It seems we have been travelling East at the same rate as the High pressure . As we slip back , so the wind increases to 8 knots and veers south , only to drop and back as far as ESE an hour later as we run up against the interface again. There was no chance of either of us falling asleep again last night as we took turns in slaloming though these changes , trimming constantly. There was no moon , and gradually the clear skies and stars of the early night were extinguished by low spreading cloud making for a very black night. By dawn the whole sky was covered except for a patch of light to the East which I fancied might be the centre of the high , gradually slipping away now if the barometer is to be believed , confirmed perhaps by the wind being more constant from the South. Its still only 7 knots or so , but as its on the beam we are making fair progress. Despite these low wind speeds we made 110 miles noon to noon , and if our Viking friends appear to have got ahead again , I suspect it is because they are motoring. Not only do we not have the fuel reserves to do this , it seems pointless if it just takes us back into the middle of the high , so we dribble on, perfectly comfortable and content.
The only advantage of a really black night like this is that it intensifies the phosphorescence, which in turn reveals dolphins under the water from far off , like erratic torpedoes zig-zagging in for the kill. Every day brings more and more of them, usually a dozen outliers who tumble around the bow for a while before racing off to join their friends who are can be seen leaping clear of the water in really large numbers somewhere on the horizon , no doubt feeding mercilessly on some poor unfortunate shoal of fish.
By contrast, the court marshal was pretty lenient ˆ all grog and shore leave stopped for 4 days , which coincidentally is the number displayed on the ETA column of the GPS when we are moving fast. When , as now , the wind is down to 4 knots it sulks and just goes blank , so we are not making any predictions either. Nonetheless our ≤ of the way packet of crisps is due in 15 miles which keeps us on our toes as we pass38 36N,38 36W ( a pleasingly symmetrical sort of place!). All well.

Tuesday sees a shamefaced skipper and a boat without a kettle. This is their sorry tale.

The night was VERY slow , and what wind there was came from dead astern . On my watch in the middle of the night it died altogether and I put the engine on. Out in the middle of the ocean I often sit in the companionway inside the bubble and put my head on the hatch in a half wake half sleep state , sitting up every 10 minutes or so to take a look around , but on this occasion my internal alarm failed and I must have dozed for nigh on 30 minutes. I woke in a panic with the smell of burning - a plastic sort of smell and my first thought was that the engine had caught fire. I rushed with an extinguisher to the fire port , but caught sight of the kettle on the stove with flames under it. Of course , I was going to make myself my mid-watch treat of hot chocolate. The kettle has long since lost its whistle and must have boiled dry and the hot metal was melting the lid of the nozzle! And that is why we are making drinks on the saucepan and Lynda and Amos the Cabin monkey are convening a court martial later on to decide if I can continue as Captain. Secretly I am hoping that I will get away with just a reprimand , as otherwise who will interpret the weather.

Ah , the weather! Theoretically we should be still struggling along with the wind directly astern as we skirt the north side of the high, but over the last few hours we have picked up a gentle SE and are now hard on the wind doing 5.5 knots in 7 knots true! This is largely down to the extraordinarily smooth sea and we are more gliding than sailing in the normal sense of the word. It feels to me as if the High is in fact dissolving and this is the first sign of the low pressure to our West which may yet give us strong to gale force Southerlies to take us in. Mind you this doesn’t tally with the pressure of 1030 , which shows no sign of decreasing as yet so I look forward to our next weather download to see if that casts any light on the problem. We have really enjoyed the light weather sailing of the past few days, having been through the gamut of most of our sails and trickled 150 miles ahead of our similarly sized passage mate , even overtaking much bigger boats. As ever they will come into their own if it blows , but for now Festina is in her element and keeping up a good average even when there seems scarcely a breath.

Lynda and I watched another episode of the Blue Planet videos this morning. Somehow it seems more real out here as all that marvellous stuff is taking place just next to us. The dolphins continue to visit regularly and we have seen really quite large numbers feeding on the horizon. Lynda was privileged to see Shearwaters feeding on a school of tiny jumping fish , whereas previously we have only ever watched in awe as they turn and bank inches above the advancing ocean swells and wondered what they live on. Several turtles have swum by and I think you probably do see more in calm weather , as in more normal conditions many of the animals are hidden by the waves.

At 1400 UT today we and the dolphins were at 38 30N 41 12 W with well under 600 miles to go . All is well ( if you don’t count a shamefaced skipper and a grotty kettle !), and there is still another evening of Christmas pud . Perfect.

Yesterday we broke all records with a noon to noon run of 188 miles! This was all the more remarkable as the last 6 hours were very light indeed , and we even changed to a small jib for the night ( we try and choose a night time rig that will ensure minimum effort and maximum sleep). At no stage was it ever more than gentle relaxed sailing , but our secret was the wind angle on our sweet spot ( 120 degrees true) where Festina will hold 7 knots in 12 knots of breeze, and our new best friend Fair Eddie ,who helped us along at up to 2.4 knots for a while. For hours on end the GPS was registering 9.5 knots over the ground whilst we just sat and read !

All good things come to an end and since dawn the wind has been around the 5-6 knot mark , Fair Eddie is running out of energy and indeed has just turned North , so we might be back in the grips of his foul cousin soon. Nonetheless we are still making 4 or 5 knots under shy kite over very gently undulating seas and clear blue skies. Over to our South there are big banks of cumulus and the occasional whispy low thin cloud drifts over our way . I wish I could understand what these clouds are telling us about the position of the high and the best way to get round or through it.

Sadly yesterday’s splendid progress and weather was spoilt by the fact that our e-mail went down. By now I am fairly confidant of these things so patiently reinstalled and checked the programmes on the computer and reintroduced the satphone links but all to no avail. The thought of trying to make our way through the complex weather systems without the wonderful level of information we have grown used to was frustrating , but of course previous generations never had these advantages , and at least one of our friends has set off knowing from the start that they would just have to rely on the clouds and a barometer , so I am sure we would have got on fine. Nonetheless it was a lovely feeling when we discovered in the early hours of this morning that our servers had been down , but all was back up and running and we were once more back in touch with the world. It has been a great help over the past few days as we have deliberately struggled North to avoid the high , and our Viking friends to the South have proven this was a good move by dropping behind. Ironically the weather info when it arrived suggests that the computers don’t really know what is going to happen next , so we might as well just head for Horta and see what happens!

We have noticed that once you get over half way , distances seem to tumble and at 687 NM to go , that puts the 2/3 mark within a days sail. As we are still eating Christmas pudding left over from our half way celebrations , the 2/3 rds packet of crisps has been reassigned to the ¾ mark ( 450 to go)! Just in case you are getting as mathematically challenged as we are , our position at 1400UT was 38 18N 43 31W. Wind SW 6 knots. We are slipping along nicely under the mango kite and if you get this then our satcoms are working fine again . All well.

The last 24 hours have brought 2 major milestones ( can you have milestones on the sea ˆ they sound unlikely to float so maybe they should be milebuoys?). First to go was the under 1000 mark ˆ its very encouraging to only have 3 digits on the clock . Next was 900 to go which we reckon as halfway so there will be the last Christmas pudding on the menu tonight complete with rum butter. Yummy! The reason for all this is that the wind has backed and is now blowing at 15 knots from our starboard quarter. This brings the apparent wind on the beam , takes away all thought of a kite and is the cruising sailors heaven - fast easy miles . On top of that we have swapped our mate Foul Eddie for his much more welcome cousin Fair Eddie who has pushed us along in the right direction at up to a knot for the last 12 hours with the result that the SOG is hovering around 8 knots and the longitude is counting down at a very satisfactory rate indeed. Compare that with the last few days and although we have been trickling along at a remarkable rate for the wind , it was rattly and rolly and with the foul current we were often only achieving 4.5 knots over the ground. Our last dolphin visit was different too . We have become used to the little spotted dolphins but this lot were bigger and either striped or common dolphin which of course we associate with the eastern side of the pond.

We are sailing up the North flank of the Azores high , which is due to move NE and block our path. Racing up astern is a system bringing strong Southerlies and the question is what happens when these two systems collide . Apart from the second night , the sailing has been remarkably gentle up to now and normally we would relish a blow to take us East , but with our potentially dodgy steering system we are pushing to slip round the back of the high before it arrives. We have a Swedish boat 50 NM to the North , and our Danish Viking friends 50 NM to the South and at dusk the atmosphere seems to bounce our VHF airwaves over to them so we have rather broken conversations due partly to the radio reception and partly the language barrier. Apparently Horta is so crowded that boats are having to anchor off and I wonder how many other yachts are in this patch of the ocean.The latest news on Roy in Guiding Light is that he has turned round and is heading for St Lucia, having spent the day caulking ( from the inside?) I just hope the weather holds off for him and he makes it.

Our midday is now UT +2 , and we are rushing past 37 37N 47 28 W . Our love to everyone . All well.

Saturday

The days roll on with little change , other than we are back in 1.4 knots of Westerly current with its accompanying chop and slowed up progess over the chart. Looking ahead our latest information is that the high we are trying to circumvent is going to move NE so rather than head up on to the reach we have been looking forward to , we must continue downwind to avoid wallowing in its calms. The winds have increased sufficiently that a kite is now marginal if it is to be left to its own devices so it is back to the poled out jib top.

This morning I had two incidences of how important it is to keep a good lookout , even in these vast “empty “ spaces. First we passed within 100 m of a fair sized buoy which I guess was an oceanographic research buoy. It had a light on top and I wont be snoozing so much on tonight’s watches as it would make a heck of a dent if you hit it. The second was a ship on a direct collision course that I had spotted a long way out and called up for a chat He was perfectly civil and agreed to pass port to port , but declined to chat as he was in the middle of fire and safety drills and was a “little bit busy”! It set me thinking , and so later this morning Lynda and I took a leaf out of his book and went once more through our fire and safety drills as well.

Lynda’s solution to staying awake on the night time watches is what she calls “Dodgy Dancing”. This involves putting one of Bryony’s compilation tapes on the ipod , standing in the gangway holding on to a winch handle with each hand , and gyrating in the way that is only possible with just the moon and stars as witness, although she claims she is practising her embarrassing moves for Bryony’s graduation celebration. You have been warned.

We have lost contact with “Zwit” , our Dutch fellow travellers , but due to some quirk of the atmosphere have been in VHF communication with our Viking friends despite being 60 miles apart. So what with that and our e-mails it somehow doesn’t feel lonely out here at all! So greetings to all. At midday ships time ( now 1400UT) our position was 36 53N 50 42 W . All well.

Our slow and gentle progress continues. We are casting a wary metaphorical glance astern as it looks like we will have some “weather “ in 3 or 4 days time. If we can keep our speed up we may just keep pace with the high as it retreats east and so the kite goes up at dawn , and is taken down , dew soaked , just as darkness falls ,to be replaced by the less demanding poled out jib top. The wind has been between 10 and 12 knots and our speed varies between 4.5 and 6.5 depending on the sea state which has been far more confused than would be expected for these mild conditions. I think this is partly due to strong winds around the low to our north setting up a big swell coming in on the beam, and partly a wretched westerly eddy at the extreme edge of the North Atlantic current which has been taking a knot or more off our progress for days now , and provides a “wind over tide“ chop over and above the northerly swell to further reduce our speed.

We have been trying to work North as much as possible (difficult because of the swell and wind angle ) and to our delight in the early hours of the morning we sailed into an easterly current at last. Immediately the seas went down , the SOG went up and life became significantly easier. If anyone is following it seems that the foul current is south of 36 North, although I have no idea how much of a fixture this is.

There is an informal SSB net amongst many of the Northbound yachts for mutual aid , and in our case we are kept informed by e-mail via the satphone. One of them is in trouble. A chap called Roy sailed a 1935 double ended cutter , Guiding Light , singlehanded out to Antigua , took part in Classic week and swept the board both in terms of presentation , distance travelled and on the race course. He was delayed because of engine problems and set out some days ago to return home. I haven’t been getting his positions as his computer was drowned ( I think he must have tangled with one of those nasty subtropical depressions I mentioned a day or two ago) but I understand that he now has a leak from the bow that he is only just able to keep pace with , he doesn’t have an engine ( he may have been unable to repair it ) , and only limited petrol for a generator. Several of our friends have been involved in alerting Falmouth and US coast guards and I understand a ship has been diverted to his position. The only good news is that he currently has light conditions.

On a happier note we reached the 1200 mile to go , 1/3rd of the way across position at 1230 UT this morning (0930 ships time) so are deep in discussion as to when we can broach our celebratory packet of crisps. Lynda is adamant that I cannot possibly have them for breakfast so it will probably be tonight as an hors d’oevres – unless I get hungry in the meantime! We will probably have to share them with Amos the ships monkey who is currently blissfully unaware of his promotion to cabin boy – or of the possible consequences of this advancement in his career!

So from 36 07 N , 53 18 W , Festina is finally getting a move on and all is well.

The problem for the next few days is how not to get engulfed in a high in front of us. We trundled along happily through the night dead downwind , but by dawn the wind was down to 10 knots and there followed much examining of tea leaves and grib files to work out what to do. Our preferred route is in fact still dead downwind to get around the top of the high ,which is a bit of a problem as in light airs and at least two different swells that could be rolly , rattly and slow! Just in the nick of time the wind popped up to 13 knots and backed just sufficiently for us to lay our course under kite with the wind 20 degrees off the stern . A few knots less and we would have to sail higher angles , a few knots more and the seas would begin to build making the kite hard work for the autopilot , so it is just about perfect , although without our net jib we would have had a load of spinnaker wraps by now. It also suggests we are about the right distance north of the high which is good news.
The only fly in the ointment are the creaks in the steering system. I examine it thoroughly every day and it LOOKS as solid as a rock , but still seems to have a sound from the pedestal from time to time. If there is a problem , there is nothing I can do about it until it shows itself , and if there is not , there is nothing to worry about , but nonetheless it is slightly reducing the pleasure of an otherwise beautiful day.
There appears to be plenty of life in this bit of ocean . Yesterday we sailed past two very large fin whales that appeared to be sleeping on the surface , and every few hours , day and night we are visited by families of spotted dolphins. We seem to have left the tropic birds behind and are now mainly accompanied by various kinds of petrels flitting over the waves. The clear skies and warm moist SW wind provide a clear contrast between day and night. Last night we broke out the woolly hats for the first time since August , whereas today we are back in shorts and sunhats.
Tomorrow should see us 1/3 of the way there , and we have a whole packet of crisps with which to celebrate ( oh yes , we live well on Festina!) , with another for 2/3rds and a Christmas pudding for half way . No wonder we have our foot down as we pass 35 30 N 55 50 W. All well.

As expected the wind died at 1300 yesterday and we settled down for a 12 hr chug , but it was not to be . A little breath came out of the SE after only 4 hours and we dribbled along until midnight when the expected veer and increase had us up to speed once more. As a result we have not had to dig as deep into our fuel supplies as we had feared , and this might be very important towards the end of the trip. Its been a lovely sunny morning and the wind has gradually risen to 19 knots from the SW, so we have pulled in a couple of reefs to help the autopilot stay on course and our dinner stay on our plates. Judging by the sky the next low is approaching and I expect we will change down to a smaller jib for the night , but unless this afternoons gribs show up something new we are not expecting anything horrid.

The only fly in the ointment is the current , which is constantly against us. We would have to get further North to be sure of a favourable drift , but need some more weather info before we are confidant to do that. The moon rises after midnight now , and is a deep orange for a while before it gets up properly. We wondered if there is Saharan sand or perhaps volcanic dust in the air as one of our friends 250 miles south of us woke up after a rain storm to find his decks covered in mud!

So all well on the good ship Festina and at 1500 UT our position was 34 55N , 58 31 W with 1450 miles to go to Horta.

Its June 1st. This side of the pond that means today is the official start of the hurricane season and we are quite pleased to be heading NE. For the past 3 weeks a series of hot wet nasty tempered little lows have been spinning off the western Caribbean and heading North and the local newscasts have been full of predictions of a particularly virulent hurricane season due to the higher than average sea temperatures. These lows can feed off the convective forces generated by hot seas and turn into tropical depressions and eventually hurricanes. The really nasty ones come later in the season and originate over by Africa , but quite honestly we don’t even want to mess with a nice , well mannered hurricane thank you very much!

The water hereabouts is nearly 10 degrees cooler than Antigua , and its getting so we have to dress warmly at night. I had never regarded this as an advantage before – but you live and learn!

We hitched a ride on our first low yesterday , and now have been engulfed by a small ridge of high pressure so are motoring NE to catch the second one. We reckon we have enough fuel for 90 hours of slow motoring and normally would like to save this in case the Azores high blocks our final approach. However it is pushing westwards at the moment so we think its worth investing a bit of our hydrocarbon so as not to get trapped early on. We have linked up with a boat load of Vikings on Fai da Te ( Italian for “do it yourself”) and a Dutch yacht called Zwit. Both of them are further East and South of us. They either pushed harder when it blew ( we as usual were v conservative) , or used their engines more initially , and it will be interesting if our more northerly route pays off. Theoretically it should , provided we don’t get a pasting from the lows. These are big , well behaved northern hemisphere lows that are relatively predictable compared with their volatile tropical cousins , but we will still treat them with respect.

Lynda visited a book swap before we left and came back with a book about the wreck of the whaling ship Essex ( I think they ate the cabin boy ) and another about a man who did what we are doing in the 60’s , but singlehanded in a 24 footer without self steering , and by the sound of it , badly controlled diabetes. He nearly died on about 100 different occasions and had to deal with would be assassins , crooks , sharks , hurricanes and most of all the effects of huge quantities of rum. Do you think she was trying to make a point?

Anyhow at present the boat is steering itself quietly past 34 07N 60 21W , and apart from an argument as which of us is the cabin boy , all is well on board

St Georges harbour emptied again on Sunday as about 6 boats left for various destinations , but mainly the Azores. One boat turned back almost immediately with a failure of his GPS antenna and our hearts went out to him . We had waited for our friends on Spruce and Rapau who had taken 2 weeks to come up from the BVI’s , having spent about 5 days hove to . They looked none the worse for their ordeal , indeed I got the impression that there was a renewed confidence that came from having weathered some truly horrid conditions.

We set off in a flat calm and after 4 hours started to dribble along at 3 knots under spi. Overnight and through this morning the wind has gradually built and we are now very comfortable under 3 reefs and a No 3 , making north of the rhumb line . The classic tactics for this passage at this time of year is to position yourself between the lows to the North and the Azores/ Bermuda high which should lie along the rhumb line route. Too far North , or too deep a low and you head south into the high pressure. If the high expands and the winds drops you head north. Well , thats the theory but up til now folk going across have had fearful bashings , yet it just MIGHT be settling down a bit so perhaps it wasn’t such a bad thing making that false start. We are riding on the south edge of the first low at the moment and expect the winds to go NW then N before dieing away tomorrow. Later the 2nd low should bring us South or SW winds , but its the one after that , outside the forecast range that we are interested in positioning ourselves for. I try to keep in the 20 knot corridor but of course its an inexact science and we appear to have overdone it on this first low. However , the further North we go , the better the current so its probably a good thing.

There appears to be less creaking from the rudder assembly . I tightened the stuffing box on the lower shaft bearing as well as adjusting the wheel input assembly so fingers crossed. At dawn this morning there was a new squeek. It sounded like a block seizing up but was difficult to locate. I went over the wind vane lines and blocks with a heavy heart until I looked up and saw 4 tropic birds squeeking away above me and no doubt wetting themselves at the sight of the greybeard loon getting all worked up below.
Later this morning I staggered out of my bunk to find Lynda looking puzzled , somewhat cross eyed and mumbling to herself. I was just getting worried when she looked up with a seraphic smile and said – “We are just over 1/18th of the way there!”

So if her maths is right – that is where we are – but just in case its not , greetings from us and a posse of squeeking tropic birds at 33 22 N 62 35W. All well.