Uno - Day 20: Lazy jacks snapped & Starlink took flight!

 Friday 8th DecemberToday we realised we have less than 400 miles to go to St Lucia, which was very exciting! During the day the kids watched another Pirates of the Caribbean movie while the rest of us napped and read books. I made a wholemeal sourdough in the morning as we are getting very low on any other kind of bread. The loaf was gone by lunchtime so another one got prepped for tomorrow. We have been having much discussion about time zones in the past few weeks as we cross 3 or 4 of them during this journey. We couldn’t agree on what time to set our phones to, so we started a new time called Uno Atlantic Time. We have been on UAT for at least a week now - basically time is only really important so that we can set our alarms for our nightshifts. However, UAT had slipped a. read more...

Uno - Day 19: Sleigh rides & risotto

Thursday 7th DecemberIt’s been a great day with good swell & wind behind us, & swell only going in one direction so it’s been like a sleigh ride surfing down the waves. Much more comfortable than the past few days too & just before midnight we will crack the “500nm to go” mark — we are coming Saint Lucia!Weather has been very settled, we’ve only seen a couple of squalls & a few very brief rain showers on our journey across so far.The kids came up with a fun game hiding a soft toy somewhere on the boat & then taking a photo where you could just see it. We (the adults) then had to go through the photos to spot the hidden moose or seal ;D It was very cool. We always say boredom breeds creativity!Lynnie made a yummy risotto for dinner using up half of our last zucchini,. read more...

Uno - Day 18: Ceviche & shooting stars

This morning morale seemed a little low, I think it’s due to the increased swell & wind, which, while it’s good for speed, it’s not very comfortable. We dodged a few squalls around lunchtime, and had ceviche with the mahi Gisele caught 2 days ago. Jacques (11) was in dinner so he made some rice & heated up Chile con Carne for dinner which was really good. Also today we put together our response to the Insta ARC singing challenge that seems to be going around & we keep getting tagged in.. Luckily we have a singer /songwriter on board (Gisele, 13) & we recorded the audio & now just the video needs a bit more work. We should be able to post it up tomorrow :-) A bit of silliness & dancing & singing (and lots of laughing) did wonders for the mood on board, smiles. read more...

Uno - Day 17: Best mileage day & new high VMG

Tuesday 5th December We had a great last 24 hours covering 165nm! A new fast VMG of 6.9 too and so now (in the morning) we have 880nm to go to St Lucia. Today our remaining bananas definitely looked dead..it was finally time to make the banana loaf recipe that “Tempus” had sent through, after I ogled the pic they posted back on day 3 or 4, of the most delicious looking bread. They turned out great! Captain rich made the yummiest dinner tonight - Mahi mahi steaks with grilled eggplant & a tomato sauce. He got a little confused on the timing & served it up at 415pm, which was pretty funny. The banana bread may come in handy for the night watch!Fast day, not too uncomfortable but a few of the crew suffering a little nausea, probably from lack of sleep. The last 2 nights have felt. read more...

Uno - Day 16: Gisele caught her first mahi mahi!

p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 19.0px '.AppleSystemUIFont'} p.p2 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 19.0px '.AppleSystemUIFont'; min-height: 24.0px} span.s1 {font-family: 'UICTFontTextStyleBody'; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; font-size: 19.00px}Monday 4th DecemberSo I said yesterday that we had not seen a squall yet, and then this morning at 715am we saw our first two show up on the radar! Protocol was to wake the captain as we had been sailing all night downwind, gull-winged & need two people to adjust the sails. Rich came up & we made a plan. The main was already reefed (following our conservative, back-of-the-pack sailing tactic ;) ) so we removed the barber hauler and preventer line to change from a downwind setup, reefed the Genoa and got ready. read more...