Well, here we are some 250 miles West of the Cape Verdes making good progress in what seem to be Trade Winds. The children had the first chocolates out of their Advent calendars today (both say 'thank you' to grandma), which feels a bit weird given that it's quite warm enough to do night watches in tee shirt and shorts.

 

We've had some good runs - we reckon 148 miles to noon yesterday and 145 to noon today. If we can keep this up, we could be in by the 13th but something like the 15th remains most likely. We've had at least one reef in for most of the time and sometimes two. The swell left over from hurricane Delta is slowly going down. The windvane is doing a good job with the steering.      

 

We've been catching more fish and we've had our first flying fish land on the deck.

 

We had a thousand mile party on Tuesday. Anna iced a cake and we ate it for tea. 

 

The boats are now quite spread out. We see another light most nights but go most days without seeing a sail. 

 

Thank you for all the messages re our recent appearance on Look East. Contrary to what they said, we are not now planning to sail round the world.

 

Middleton children will get a copy of the tape in due course.