Atlantic Blog#17 - Thursday 11th December 2014

A day of surprises!  After a glorious latter part of the night, we sat down to breakfast as usual.  Muesli, honey nut crunchies, milk and orange juice, and Danny baking par bake rolls in the galley with coffee.  A dull thud.  A door banging closed in the heads perhaps.  From Deb 'Did anyone notice when the mainsail came down!'  What!! Thank goodness for the lazyjacks (guides down each side of the mainsail to pack it onto the top of the boom when lowering the sail).  Yes, the main had come down all of a sudden.  Chafe on the halyard cutting through it?? Luckily not, because we could see the remains of the shackle which used to be attached to the top of the mainsail in the pulley at the mast head.  Well, we could have used the topping lift as a makeshift halyard.  But Johnny thought best to retrieve the stronger proper halyard if we could.  Yes, that meant going up the mast.  So duty called on the skipper and up he went.  Stalwart winchman Danny was not prepared for a long slow pull up the mast, so on fast speed on the manual winch up J went.  He doth proclaim it was a bit wobbly, and you could see he was clinging on with muscles bulging.  But he got there, grabbed the halyard, and inspected everything at the top too!  New shackle, and back up she goes.  Back to normality.  Well, would you believe.  No sooner had calm returned, than the generator spluttered, coughed and stopped, during the battery charging double hour.  Phut!!  I don't think that was quite the word.  Pre-filter changed in quick time, only to find the electric pump with heart attack.  Into the spares, and yes, that cylindrical round thing, of which there are 3, is NOT a spare pump.  No spare pump.  Note, to self - buy 2 as replacements.  So we progress through our penultimate day without the aid of the generator.  Batteries charged with the engine alternators this evening, will keep us going 'til morning.  We have plenty of water, both in the tanks for washing and bottles for drinking, so we are fit for the next 48 hours.  But an interesting start to Thursday!!  Chocolate brownie made yesterday for tea, and cassoulet from the bilge tins for supper.  We are ready for another night of good winds and moonshine.  We are making good speed, but for one 5 knot/hour we have been in the 6s and 7s each hour today.  We passed into the 100s (199) just after midnight (Thu/Fri) so look set for a Saturday morning (UTC -4) arrival.  Yippeeeee!