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Aretha - Sailing past French Guyana - 06 14 North 051 54 West



The hatches are all closed tonight as we are sailing close hauled on the wind. We had one wave through the saloon window earlier which was one wave too many. As a result its sweltering below decks tonight.

The crew are all sleeping apart from one passenger we seem to have picked up. A small bird hitching a lift on top of our bimini (the cockpit sun cover) It’s been chatting away for the past few hours. We suspect it may have flown into the mainsail and injured itself. We’ll investigate more in day light tomorrow.

We are passing lands which we know little of. First past the Amazon and now off the coast of French Guyana - a French colony apparently full of French expats in the same way Reunion and French Polynesia are. Then, we’ll pass Surinam, Guyana and Venezuela. From catching up on the Economist we have a better understanding of why Venezuela has become a piracy hotspot - inflation running at some 200% and the economy in trouble. Doesn’t make for a settled place - we’ll be giving it a wide berth.

Along this coast line, we’ve made the wrong strategic calls so far. We focused on getting the wind angles right and didn’t pay enough attention to the huge currents here which can work massively in your favour. We’ve got a great programme Weather 4D Pro which along with the winds shows the currents. We’ve managed to get ourselves in some great current now and have around 2-3 knots flowing with us giving us a very fast 10 knots. We estimate that for the past 24 hours we’ll have sailed some 220 miles - a big distance for us.

The crew are all settled into the passage now. Schooling is in good flow - writing fiction stories and book reviews, I’m reading the 39 Steps with Bluebell and Lord of the Flies with Columbus. Maths has been made easier by some handy apps which the kids are now using daily to keep sharpening their mental maths skills.Today we had a half way party - beef and veg stir fry, fairy cakes made by Bluebell and a Harry Potter film.

Nichola and I are getting time to continue with our plans and what we do next. Grenada is only some 3-4 days away where we will celebrate completing our circumnavigation crossing our outbound track. It will be very strange arriving there having left there in January last year to sail the Carribean sea and joining the World ARC fleet in the San Blas Islands.

Time to go on deck and check on our feathered friend and cool down.

Team Aretha, Out.



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