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Blue Summit - Blue Summit: Days 1-3



A three day delay? No problem for the fabulous Caribbean 1500 Rally staff who organized impromptu seminars, tours and a wonderful trivia night while the fleet of 30+ boats waited for tropical storm Kate to clear out. And when she did finally exit stage right, off the fleet went under a star splashed sky (with Jupiter, Mars and Venus slung low in the sky), propelled by a beautiful north wind bound for Tortola in the British Virgin Islands.

Sailors don't always get to choose the wind and seas they have, but it doesn't stop this Goldilocks from wanting it "just right." We have seen too much wind (30-35, gusting to 40 knots one night), too little wind, (light to nothing the first night out resulted in burning fossil fuel for a few hours when our speed dipped below 3 knots, yuck) and perfect wind (15-20 knots beam or astern= fabulous) . On the plus side, the 40 knot gusts in the middle of the night were an adrenaline rush, gave Blue Summit a lovely salt water wash down, and afforded us the opportunity to "redecorate" by better securing items that took a tumble during the tumult. Thankfully nothing was damaged and the boat handled beautifully, surfing down waves (at 17 kts) with aplomb.

One of the certainties of life aboard is that something will always be cranky, broken or fickle-and needing attention. The gremlins who inhabit our first reefing line refuse to relinquish control of it after several attempts to evict them, so at this point we can go full main or resort to the ever-cooperative but infinitely slower second reef. Also, our batteries sometimes welcome a solar charge and at other times are deluded into thinking they are full and refuse it so we are replacing the sensor today in the hopes that that remedies the situation.

We are well, Blue Summit is happy to be at sea, and it's a beautiful day. Blessings indeed!



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