T-Rex - 2023 11 27 - Night Watch

This evening’s 1am to 4am watch included a squall with gusts to 20kts and a scattering of rain, followed by a wind shift that led to a planned gybe at 3am, and for the coup de grace, I got hit by a flying fish while standing at the helm. It was probably worse for the fish than for me, though I did get it back into the water fairly quickly.. read more...

T-Rex - 2023 11 26 - A flying congregation of egrets

Our egret stayed around long enough to get named Greta. She spent most of the evening and early night watches on the foredeck, away from the crowd. At 2:09 according to the log, two more egrets flew by and roused her enough to go see what all the fuss was about, but she circled back about ten minutes later. At least, we assume it was the same egret, not one of the others having heard of our excellent hospitality deciding to get a little rest. Greta stayed on the aft deck next to the stowed fishing pole for the rest of the night, hoping to see some action (so were we all, Greta, so were we all), but did enjoy some fresh water poured across the deck in the morning for her benefit. She lasted through setting a pole for wing and wing, though she declined to stay on deck for that, and circled. read more...

T-Rex - 2023 11 25 Part 2 - The Egret Has Landed

With only two people on deck, the egret decided our cockpit was big enough to take a chance. What a cutie.IMG_9376. read more...

T-Rex - 2023 11 25 - Gaff-rigged schooner, ahoy!

First of all, we’re glad to hear that the egret that circled our boat yesterday looking for a secure place to land seems to have found a nice roost on Risque Business. Egrets don’t generally hang out near water deeper than their knees, so we were sad it didn’t think our boat had any worthy resting places. Our second noteworthy moment of the day is when the Avontuur came into sight. We had seen a boat on our AIS in the wee hours without a name, just an MMSI, and Teff searched it down by figuring out that the 664 start indicated it was a Seychelles flagged boat and there were no Seychelles boats on the ARC+ comms list. So he checked MarineTraffic for that MMSI, and there it was, a gaff-rigged schooner by the name of Avontuur. Apparently it is running passengers and cargo in a zero-emission. read more...

T-Rex - 2023 11 20 - Our first 24 hours at sea

Our first full day back at sea, having departed at noon two days after the rest of the pack due to a mainsail track repair.  We broke out the jamon iberico to celebrate our first 24 hours at sea. T thinks it won’t last, but it only has to last 12 days (hopefully) and I think it could take almost that long to get through. We’ll see. It is salty enough that despite tasting great, you can’t eat too much at one time. The YB Races has us 3rd from last, which matches our departure from port. We are optimistic that we will get to Grenada by Dec 3, so we will probably catch up with a number of the smaller boats before that point. Most of the PredictWind models show a very southerly route, but we are not convinced it will be worth it. Most of the fleet looks like they are staying closer. read more...