An increasingly warm, sunny and calming day today as we headed past Lanzarote to port and on south west towards St Miguel in the South  of Tenerife.

The crew have been doing jobs – Neil and I both had a struggle getting it up this morning and then it came crashing down - the whisker pole that is, so we took to gentler tasks - whipping and splicing ropes, polishing and tidying the boat in preparation for our arrival estimated now for first light tomorrow morning.

We used the lead line today for a different purpose than usual but it reminded me of the _expression_ ‘swinging the lead’. This was the job of one man up forward – to swing the lead line then throw it forward and as the yacht catches up with the line and the lead is on the sea bed he can measure the depth and would call out ‘by the lead so many fathoms’. He was swinging the lead, that was all he had to do, others were busy tugging, heaving, pulling etc but he had an easy life, hence the _expression_.

We had a day of expressions. Skip was preparing to do some fiddling ie splicing a multi plat rope using an instrument called a fid. A difficult task requiring great skill and perseverance – think I’ll sleep on it and try tomorrow...

We have also been fishing for  tuna or other big game fish and it dawned on me to change another well known old _expression_:

Give me a fish and I  am fed for a day

Give me a fishing line and I’ll starve to death

You got it, nothing, zero, zilch, rien, nowt, ingenting, nada, niente!

Oh well sausage and Spanish omelette it is for supper.

Crew are also tidying themselves with razors, shampoo and clean clothes in abundance in anticipation for stepping ashore. The evening light is fast fading and a full moon behind us has Janet feeling romantic, which is a bit of a waste, even though Steve has scrubbed up moderately well.

All is well.

Skip