Our position @ 1432UTC 4 52.S 34 56.W
Yesterday we had the start of the last leg of this World Arc Rally,'10-'11. It was a fine start with light winds and a few boats seemed to go over the line quite closely. There was a little banter between OJ and CH but the captains settled down and gave each other a smile and a wave. Everyone had some good words to say in our departure over the radio to Paul and Suzanna for making our stay in Brazil so nice. We on Crazy Horse do appreciate all their work to make our stay a pleasant and exciting one. They even herded us into taxis when the buses got delayed in all the traffic of the carnaval. It had to be a challenge to keep us all safe and accounted for. But they did a grand job!
So we have been having a wonderful sail this whole time since the start yesterday. Many of the boats reefed down since we had many squalls last night. We are in the midst of some right now. We did reef down the mainsail at 6am this morning. We were just too overpowered with the wind and waves. Some of our kts per hour were in fact 10. Many of the boats reported heavy rains and some high winds throughout these squalls.We are going around the top of Brazil so perhaps this is all to be expected. No one reported many fishing boats but we did see some ships passing last night. Currently the wind is from 10-15kts and in the squalls up to 30kts. The rain makes it pretty difficult to see anything so good that we have radar. WE are all surprised to get this wind since we had heard that it was to be light winds. Go figure! That is the way of the weather-unpredictable. Although they did predict these squalls and in fact include them in every day's forecast. We could hear many of the captains over the radio yesterday wondering if they made the right move to go out to sea further or stay closer to shore. I was hearing their predictions of weather. Our captain decided to take the route closer to shore and he was sticking with it. This strategy keeps them all busy looking at weather and asking each other what is happening in their neck of the woods. Guess that is our version of TV.
So as we move on further up the coast we hope to see some sun. But for the moment these clouds and rain seem at least to be giving us some much needed wind. Of course, there is always the problem of asking for a little and getting too much.
Now, our next problem seems to be -What should we have for dinner? Last night we had filet of steak with gorgonzola cheese. There was also some broccoli and rice to round it out. Back to our routine on the ocean. The first day seems to be one where we are all tired and must get used to our watches.
Rosemary, Bill and Matt