We had a blustery night with winds up to 35 knots at midnight. The sea was lumpy and then it started to rain, heavily! This isn’t the transatlantic trade wind sailing I signed up for! Addictive Sailing (Marsaudon TS5) and Minimole (Neel 47) have gone North of us and are getting quite a pasting from the weather, I hope they are ok too.
We reduced sail from the warmth and dry of the sail station, right adjacent to the helm and so nobody had to go out side or even get wet…that’s one of the great safety features of this design. Watch keeping in these conditions at the helm without having to put on wet weather gear is a big bonus. I’m not sure that being on watch that close to the galley is doing my waistline any good – it’s too easy to get a light snack when there’s nothing else happening!

Today has been an exercise in trying to interpret weather forecasts and getting our selves into the best position for the next phase of the trip – downwind! We are now headed south with the wind coming directly from the track we wanted to follow. The sea-state is from yesterday’s storm and so it’s pretty lumpy but the boat has been doing well in 2-3m seas on the bow and still making 6-9 knots at 40 degrees to the apparent wind!

The wind has dropped this afternoon and so we are now back to full main and jib. Another day of this and then the North Easterly winds should set in and we can again head directly for St Lucia.

Fair Winds

Mark