Feb 2-5, Slow Going
The past 4 days have been pretty slow going and much alike one another. A slight sea, winds less than 10 knots, and the sails barely filled with enough wind. When we were bashing around in the Indian Ocean I was dreaming of these calm waters, and now that I’m here I am wishing for those windy high-mileage days! The sea is always bluer on the other side of the ocean…
We’re taking advantage of the calm weather to do all the odds and ends on the boat. Yesterday (or was it day before yesterday?) Nep whipped every line-end on the boat that needed it. In the process, he stuck himself in the finger with the sailmaker’s needle–ouch!
Our daily mileages have been 121, 125, 105… hopefully things will pick up soon. We just got a few more knots this evening and our boat speed is back up in the 5-knot range again. Our plan is to cross the equator at longitude 30W where the ITCZ (doldrums) should be narrower, and then pick up the NE tradewinds for the last 2,000 NM to the Caribbean. Staying a bit further to the East before crossing the equator should hopefully give us a better sailing angle in the NE trades, hopefully with the winds aft of the beam.
The moon is waxing and each night our night watch gets a little bit brighter. Always nice to have a full moon on the graveyard watch! As this passage is likely to take us over a month of sailing, we will experience a complete lunar phase cycle at sea. Our arrival to BVI should see us with a returning moon and going into the neap tide, all good things.
