Atlantic Blog#11 - Thursday 4th December 2014

Spectacular sunrises and brilliantly coloured sunsets mark the two ends of our days.  Light airs are hampering fast forward progress, so we are down to scraping 5 knots per hour across the ground.  Keen to increase the pace, we flew the cruising chute in a number of guises this morning, first on the starboard tack, then on the port tack with the pole out to starboard, then as a spinnaker with the pole.  None proved devastatingly better than the genoa poled out, and all took us to the north of west.  So we eventually reverted to our standard rig, and took to doing other things around the boat.  We did pull the genoa down and inspect the halyard for chafe - all very good, as the leather sheath has done its work.  And a small tear in the UV strip at the foot was stitched to prevent any further damage from the frequent flogging of the sail.  Today was the first fishing day, though the extent of the catch was a tangled line between spool and fishing rod.  At least the lures were retrieved in tact.  You should see the size of Debs'.  If she catches a tuna with that, we shall be eating fish for the next week!  Tanya cooked an amazing pork and apple supper, a concoction which we named Pork Atlantique.  Johnny seems to have caught sleeping disease, as not only did he sleep through his off watches last night, but also 3 of the 4 hours on watch, Deb was oh so good to him.  James is making up for all those hours he lay idle in the first 10 days, now he is an almost constant helmsman.  And the fridge and freezer have been cleaned of the food past its sell by date, over board.  There has been much reading in evidence today, as our free time seems to be more now.  We put that down to less hands-on helming.  If we could just please have a little more wind, we would certainly sacrifice down time for the strictures of the helm.  Come on wind, do your best for us!  Our Yellow Brick pings show we are still maintaining what looks like a second position in Class G, though where the rest of the Cruising Division boats are, is obscure to us.  We saw 3 distant lights last night at 3, 6 and 9 o'clock from us.  That has been the extent of any contact over the past 48 hours.  The peaceful seascape and the brilliance of the sun though the day with its colours at sunset are truly magnificent and complement the lack of external human contact.