eXite - Exite 8/11

All is well on board and we are steadily rolling towards Cape Verde. Since early morning we can visually see other boats again, right now a pack of around eight boats with roughly the same direction and speed as us.
After the morning weather report we decided to go a bit more W to avoid what could potentially be a gale outside Africa, and we are now holding a course a bit away from it and straight towards the destination.

The fifth crew member, Mr Autopilot, decided to have a slight issue during the night. Apparently it suddenly didn’t like the calibration of the rudder sensor and wanted us to recalibrate - easy to do in around 3m swell and 20 knots of wind, when the manual says that it should be calm and flat water (a restart seem to have fixed it for now)… Putting it on the list to do in Cape Verde and hope he plays nice until then. Otherwise we will abandon him for the new make in the aft locker.

The morning started with fixing the toilet (changing the joker(?) valve), and filling up the water tank with the newly installed water maker. Still amazed that we can refill fresh water in the middle of the ocean!

The kids have settled in fine and the adults are getting there as well, though a bit slower this time it seems. We are all taking it easy for now - sleeping, reading, watching iPads, playing, resting, eating, eating & eating; and taking the first reef a bit earlier than usual just to make life easier for everyone.

The waves settled a bit this morning so we threw out the fishing lines. The kids are more than eager to catch a big one, apparently they want a swordfish, or a “mega fish” whatever that is - so wish us luck!