Winds continued to be very light through the afternoon and evening of the 26th. We landed another Dorado which was quickly filleted and put in the freezer. We also had a strike on our portside rod & reel but didn't notice it until all the line was run off the reel. Ken put on the rod harness and worked the fish in for about 15 minutes. It seemed like there were 2 miles of line on the reel and the fish struggling added to the forward momentum of the boat made it a lot of work. When the fish was finally landed it turned out to be a large blowfish of some type which promptly inflated itself. We took its picture and let it go.
Liz and Graham made spaghetti Bolognese with salad and garlic bread for dinner and we had an appetizer of the Spanish equivalent of Parma ham carved from the whole leg we are carrying.
Given that we need to get further south as quickly as possible before the current winds off the coast of Mauretania shift further offshore, Chris decided to take the calculated risk of keeping the spinnaker up after dark as long as we could see the horizon. There is no moon at all, but without the shore light pollution the stars sill give quite a bit of light. We also shifted our watch schedule to keep 2 on watch as long as we are flying the spinnaker so that we could more quickly douse it if necessary. By dousing it we mean that there is a sock which rides over the sail. We pull it up to the top of the sail when we want to fly the spinnaker, and we pull it down to collapse the sail when we want to bring it in. Unlike the Genoa and main, we have to physically attach and remove the spinnaker each time it is used. It is stowed in the sail locker when we are not flying it.
We flew the spinnaker until 2200 when we could see a bank of cloud approaching the boat. As we had no way of knowing whether there was a line squall accompanying the cloud, we doused the spinnaker and flew the Genoa for the remainder of Wed. evening. Winds continued very light and variable until 0630 when the wind picked up to 10 knots. About 1100 on Thur. we hit the 15-20 knot winds we have been driving toward for the last few days and are now doing 7 knots for a change. Hopefully we will get a sustained 25 knots soon which is a great wind speed for this boat. Motion at this speed is very comfortable with none of the rolling of a monohull. We will continue driving down the coast of Africa for another day before heading west.
Crew are well.
Happy Thanksgiving to all!
.Ken, Chris, Gareth, Patrick & Liz