Parson Jack - PJ Blog 3rd Dec

It is blisteringly hot now, how we all wish for cold wet days of England in December, yeah!

We are on track heading straight for St Lucia; day 10 and a mere 1078 nautical miles to go.

As a special treat last night we all had Chocolate Brownies, cooked by Craig drizzled with Baileys arent we sophisticated?

Charlie Watch We had another encounter with a large ship wich passed 4 NM to our stern, close enough!
Last night saw our first encounter with a squall, just off our starboard beam around 0300 it glowered at us as we watched it on our radar; they show up as a yellow thumb print on the screen and it came within 3 NM, at which point we put three reefs in, then for some inexplicable reason it decayed and by the time Lima came on watch it had disappeared; that's squalls for you.

The wind; although in the right direction has dropped significantly and we have only made 133 miles in the last twenty four hours. Fortunately we are picking up the North Equatorial Current which is adding between a half and one knot.
We had a bit of a scare this morning; the generator did not start. We had left the radar scanner on all night which had depleted the batteries to the point where there was insufficient juice to start the generator. Fortunately the engine start battery is on a different circuit and we were able to start the engine to charge the aux batteries. We wont do that again!!

Steve is still tussling with the watermaker, every time he turns his back it cuts out, infuriating.

Stef is having a go at bread making having had his second shower of the voyage, the benchmark is high as Craig and I have become fairly expert in the dark art of bread making. Lamb Tagine tonight, yum, yum.

Craig is having a well earned kip and Lindsay is fast asleep on the bow.

STOP PRESS Breaking news.....Susan has chipped her toenail, major surgery is planned.