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Luna Quest - Sunday, September 6th, 2015



Noon Position: 10.44S 120.34E

Daily run: 127 logged miles

We have left the Timor Sea and have entered the Indian Ocean on our way to Lombok (Indonesia). We are passing the island of Sumba, vaguely distinguishable to starboard, at a speed of 6.5kn. We must maintain this speed to reach Lombok in the morning of Tuesday to give us safe passage to the anchorage Gile Gede, but the Indian Ocean is very restless despite a near absence of wind. There is an aggressive swell from the South, set up no doubt by gales near southern Australia, that rocks the boat quite violently at times. It is impossible to carry any sail and dangerous to go on deck. The distance to Lombok is 300 miles and we either do 150 miles a day for two days or a 100 miles a day for three days. We have chosen to make our arrival on Tuesday to enable us to participate in the various activities that the World ARC has organised for us, including visiting rice fields. But in our dash to arrive on Tuesday, we are being thrown about by our sail-less Luna Quest and burning up the last of our diesel at the fastest rate possible! If our calculations are correct we could be at anchor in Gile Gede Tuesday afternoon.

It is 33 degrees Centigrade (95 Fahrenheit) inside the boat and a great deal hotter outside. The nights are a little cooler and quite pleasant with billions of stars and a waning moon coming out at around 2am. There were several fishing boats last night that were picked up on our radar and that we managed to avoid as a result. There is very little commercial shipping in evidence here, much less we expected.

Eric

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