Mairmade - Day#8

At 1pm UTC today we hit the 1 week mark!

We covered a lot of ground in the first half of last night, but the wind shift to the East forced us North and into a gybe to pick up a Southwesterly heading. For the 5am-8am watch (Claudia's) we furled the headsail and sailed deeper downwind to the SW with just the main.

Chloe the Code-0 was called into action again this morning but is now getting the rest of the day off with the winds speed again approaching her threshold of pain.

Our 24-hour distance was 178nm, 20nm more than the day before with the help of the 15-20 knot winds. The 1-week total sailed distance was 1197nm, which took us ~1040nm from Las Palmas "as the crow flies" (if a crow could fly that far😛). That same crow could make it to St. Lucia from here in ~1660nm, but we'll have to go a bit further; especially since our heading is about 20 degrees from St. Lucia right now 😭

We always knew it was going to be a challenge to sail deep downwind with our available equipment, and we have yet to be surprised 🤪.

I used to be concerned about that, but our friends Charlie and Lizz reminded me that adding specialized downwind gear might get us there's a day or two earlier, cost a lot of money, and is a storage problem once you get to the other side. It's also why you might see us going a different direction from other boats, or zig-zagging a bit (if you can see that on the tracker).

Still. We're making progress and we have zero engine hours 🙌. I also hear that used downwind gear is available at rock bottom prices on the other side 🤣

That's the update for now. Have a great Sunday everyone.