Apologies for not completing an entry on Sunday, which
is unforgiveable. We have no excuse, except over-excitement or mind-numbness,
perhaps. We had a mixed 36 hour's sailing, with Saturday night being light
to the point that Bob (Alan) had no steerage way on his watch. It got better,
but was still a painfully slow night and we made little headway. We were wary
about using up the last of our diesel motoring, and thus had to live with it as
the old seamen were forced to (but with the advantage of a fridge and
freezer).
When daylight broke, the wind picked up to about 8-12
knots, and we nursed the Parasailor to give us a bit of boat
speed, which increased a bit as the day wore on. It ripened even more
later, and we began to feel optimistic about bridging the last 100 miles before
Monday morning.....
...and we almost made it! The wind faded as we
approached St Lucia late evening, and we crawled round the top of the
island to ghost over the finishing line at 0040 local time. It took an absolute
age to get the whole boat over the line as we had < 4knots of wind and it was
on the nose! At the same time, we had a photographer buzzing round the boat
trying to take pictures of a jubilant crew - he must have struggled
since he spent 20 minutes and gigabytes of memory before going off with a
grump! It then started to rain, believe it or not, but it was hot
rain!
Welcomed by a couple of brave people with a glass of rum
punch, a basket of fruit, and a can of beer, we quickly put the boat to bed, and
followed it quickly.... 21 days at sea, after the false start, constant motion
and noise, and then you cannot sleep because it is too quiet! Still, we can used
to that...
We will be back with a few bon mots, more pics and some
philosophy (or something) but in the meantime,
Take Care All
(and think about the boats till out there!)
Watergaw