Sailing around the World (presently at Sea )
A Lady
Stephen Hyde
Sat 9 Oct 2010 06:48
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FRIDAY 8th OCTOBER
2010 ( Day 12 at Sea
)
Total distance from the Coci's Islands to
Mauritius.....................................2,313 miles
Distance remaninig to Mauritius
.................................................................222
miles
Weather..................................................................................................Blue
skies, blue sea's ,
Distance travelled in the last 24 hrs,
...........................................................197
miles
We had a great night at Sea, beautifull sailing
conditions with a steady 18 / 20 knot breeze from the ESE pushing
us along with the Blue spinniker flying. ( The
mighty Bag of Fear ). we avereged 8.5 knots for the night.
We did have an adverse current for a long period
during the night, but on the other hand we saw no traffic or trawlers that
required
evasive action.
09.00hrs Radio Call :- Today , "
Drammer" were duty net controllers, Hans & Emi are sailing their boat
on their own and are from the Netherlands,
There are at least 4 boats on this trip that are
being sailed by just husband and wife, Well done to them, This sort of
trip not only
needs a lot of courage, but a great belief in your
own ability..
Most of the day was spent pottering around the
boat, keeping in touch with other boats, emails, and the BLOG.
As I said before, this blog is like having a pet ,
a dog, a rabbit, a parrott, or whatever, but BUT, whatever, it has to be fed
every day.
Lunch, actually a snack : we sat
there in the cockpit in glorious weather and stuffed our faces
with crackers and cheese, no alcohol as
we are still at sea... Actually its a bummer
not having wine with crackers and cheese, As " Harry Fitzgerald "
one of our lecturers
at college used to say to us in situations like
that, " Its like having a living room without a fire, or a bed without a woman,
"
17.00hrs We lowered the spinniker as the wind
had died down and the " Bag of fear " was swinging from side to
side with the swell
at the time, and in danger of wrapping itself
around the forestay once more. We had enough of that a few nights to last us for
the rest of the trip.
We then set up a goosewing and sailed on,
18.00hrs, Distance to
destination....................................158miles
We will arrieve in Mauritius
tomorrow, perhaps around lunch time , at least one
day ahead of our ETA, thanks to the gales we had on the
way.
Dinner consisted of :- Roast stuffed chicken,
chicken rolls in puff pastry, and fried rice, by Aileen
We listened to Tzaganie on the 6 pm radio and they
were having roast beef, God bless England for their roast
beef.
We had now a very strong current sweeping us south,
the wind was getting very light , so we reved up the iron mainsail ( engine
)
and motor sailed.
It was a magnificant evening, and the sun was a
huge ball of fire going down over the horizon, Actually, we have often
heard other crews talking
about the green flash as the sun dissapeard below
the horizon, but as far as we could make out, no one ever saw the thing,
Well we did last night, just an instant flash, but
skipper thinks it was caused by the suns rays catching the tops of waves in
between us and the sun,
but it was quite significant, we have looked
out for this over the last 24,000 miles , ande never yet saw it untill tonight,
and may never see it again.
Darkness fell and the stars were just splendid,yet
again, a crystal clear night.
Watches
:-
21.00hrs / 00.00 hrs.......................................
Terry
00.oohrs
//03.00hrs..........................................Skipper
03.00hrs /
06.00hrs.........................................Neil
06.00hrs /
08.00hrs.........................................Aileen
After 12 days at sea, we are nearly there , ( do
you remember the kids in the car saying " are we there yet, are we there yet !
")
so we are all excited at the thought of walking
ashore in Mauritius tomorrow.,
thats it for now,
Signed :- Stephen
Hyde ( skipper )
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