Resolute of Thames - 3 Days In = Nearly Halfway

Life on board is now well settled into our routine and with just over 400nm in the bag we are, as we enter our fourth day at sea, almost halfway there. Today a bit of a resume of the sailing so far. Yep, sailing, the motor has not been used in anger since just before the start. In the warm weather and with all the e-mails it has however been in great demand to provide power to the fridge, freezer, radio and Sat C. With the wind behind us the wind generator has just not been able to produce more than about 4 amps - a mere drop in the ocean for us power hungry individuals.

We crossed the start about 8 seconds late under headsail only and then had a slow 2 hours as we headed south to the airport and the start of the wind acceleration zone. As predicted by the WCC team we knew exactly where the zone started as we watched the lead boats (with cruising chutes and spinnakers) get blown over. For reasons we do not yet fully understand a sizable proportion of the fleet seemed to head well off to the east from the start line. We however ran through the acceleration zone under a well furled genoa at 7 knots.

Once clear of the acceleration zone we poled out a full genoa on the port side and set a working jib flying free on the other side. This rig has carried us nearly half way without any fuss. Last evening we had a bit of a wobble as we were some 10nm off the rhumb line and the wind went ENE which would take us further west. My reaction was to change the rig over (ie drop the jib - take the genoa off the pole - put the pole on the other side - gybe the genoa - put the jib back up) we just sort of looked at each other and decided to leave it. This morning we are only 5nm off track and with something over 450nm to go what is 5nm between friends? I reflected last night that in the days before GPS we would not even have known that we were 5nm miles off the most direct route between Gran Canaria and Sao Vicente as, given my skills with a sextant, that would be well within the circle of error!

So what of the rest of the fleet. Well we have seen Solar Blue on a couple of occasions. She is running under mainsail and headsail and gybing across the rhumb line. I suspect we provide her westward gybing point. We have heard Amalie 2 as she has assumed some responsibility for the SSB radio net. We think our Ozzie friends aboard Fanny Fisher were part of the dash east. So getting a bit lonely out here! Leaving aside the big racing machines and the faster cats to focus on the other cruising boats (who are in my mind the competition and in Gill's our companions)I suspect that we are either last or in a bit of a competition to see if the direct route (we have tried to take) will be quicker than a dog leg to get better conditions. Not that we care, much! We have just finished today's chat on the SSB radio so it looks like we are in the rear third of a pack of 8 boats all doing much the same thing - as BT said once it is good to talk!

The weather, and not only the wind, has given us more cause for concern. To use the ancient trade winds adage, was to go south 'until the butter melts'. Well we have left it out but it has not melted probably because there has been very little sunshine and what is worse last night there was almost complete cloud cover - very dark. There is some hope as this morning we found a very dead flying fish on the deck and currently the sun and some very blue sky is making a bit of a guest appearance. As we keep remarking...I suppose it is not bad for November!