Risque Business - Day 5 Thursday 9th Nov - RB Blog

19:47.99N 022:37.46W

Yesterday, Wed 8th Nov, we managed 184 NM in total from midnight to midnight, which was 4 NM further than the day before and 11 NM further than Tuesday's tally, so we're fairly pleased. We are currently on a heading of 225 deg which, if the wind remains the same, gives us a decent chance of reaching the finish line without putting in another jibe. However, the forecast is showing that the winds will die from the mid 20 kts to low to mid teens tomorrow, so our progress will be slowed sadly.

The sea has been really rolly with large waves picking RB up from the stern and rolling her about. It makes standing and even sitting down a challenge and everything is sliding around the cabin. On the HF radio net this morning many boats reported the same conditions, so you feel for the smaller ones in the fleet! We're still just flying the large genoa without a main, so we can run downwind as deep as we can without the spinnaker pole. Hopefully DB will have the replacement part when he joins us in Cape Verde.

Life on board has settled down into 2 hour, single person watch routines which roll through the 24 hrs. Dinner last night was a lovely fish pie courtesy of Mark. Sadly the fish was bought from the supermarket in Las Palmas and not caught! Only one fish landed to date and that went back in as it was "only a wee snackette" according to Nick. However the decks were strewn with flying fish this morning - 20 by Nick's reckoning, so RB is clearly attractive to fish, just not our lures sadly.

We have 218 NM to go, so hopefully a day and a bit....... but that depends on the wind of course.

RB Out.