Wednesday, June 13, 2012

Day 8 - A nice clear day of sailing!

About 1AM in the night before we rain into some more rain with winds of 20-25 knots. It was a very dark night so hard to see the clouds, therefore we got wet before we had a chance to get our foul weather gear on. Once we got through it and the wind calmed down, got dried off & put the "foulies" on which was great for keeping us warm as well as dry. The wind shifted after the rain to the west, then northwest with winds of 12-13 knots so able to continue sailing without the motor.

We woke up today, June 13th to a beautiful sunrise, but not much wind, 8-10 knots so had slowed down quite a bit. There were quite a few clouds all around us, but by 10AM it cleared off to be a beautiful day. We kept working at trimming our sails to get as much speed as possible and are heading in a more northernly direction. We heard from our weather forecaster and he was advising that we should try to get north as quickly as possible and that may be we should have the engine on if we get below 4.5knots. We had the engine on for a few hours today as a result, but then the wind picked up, Bob "tweaked" the sails more and we were able to turn off the engine and have a great sail north. We now have been averaging 5.5 knots which has been great.

Just a short time ago we were visited by a pod of dolphin, but they didn't hang around for long. Bob said he probably scared them away as he was showering out back at the time!!

Bob is making pizza for dinner tonight which sounds good - as everyone said, food will be important on the trip and we confirm that fact.

We are enjoying staying in touch with Saralane (our friends that are currently in BVI) as well as Drum (the other boat crossing to the Azores) twice a day. It really is amazing how little boat traffic we have seen - only 2 boats so far.

Our daily mileage for day 7 was 122 miles giving us a total of 854 since leaving St. Martin. A friend of ours just arrived in the Azores (Flores) and it took him 21 days - we will see how long it takes us!

We are taking photos along the way and will be posting them when we get to the Azores. Take care & will touch base again tomorrow.

Our position as of 6PM (EST) on June 13 is 26.50.79N, 53.40.48W
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