We have now got into to the Trade Wind belt and enjoy a steady NE wind of 8 – 20 kn, waves of 3 – 4 meter high and with 10 – 12 seconds intervals. We have taken some reefs ( in the sails!) and still doing between 6, 5 – 8 kn. Great sailing which keep us in good shape!
The Trade Winds characteristics are the existing wind direction and clouds similar to the “puffs” from a steam engine. There are also the Squalls, “mini” low pressure, which appears quickly and contains sometime gale force winds of 15 – 40 kn and rain showers. They pass quickly but you need to try to stay away from them or reef early. So, under the existing conditions, which according to the weather forecast will continue at least over the next couple of days, we estimate to complete the remaining 1 056nm to St Lucia within 6-7 days.
We wound the ship’s clock back one hour today, having completed another 15 degrees west, which always keeps our spirits high! We are 3 hours behind GMT, and 2 hours ahead of US east coast time.
Apart from great winds and sailing we have also been swimming in the Ocean. Very DEEP waters, about + 4 000 m and it was a rather unusual and little scary situation. But no Sharks or even if the visibility was very good we could not see sea bottom. Strange?
Yesterday, after 3 days of fishing, we also landed another dorado, 1 m long and about 5 kilos, which will be served for dinner tonight.
On the celestial front the sky remains more interesting than the surface of the sea especially with lack of company from dolphins and whales. Each night the Milky Way stretches from horizon to horizon and captures many of the constellations ordinarily seen in the Northern Hemisphere but for the last 2 nights, just before dawn we have been blessed with seeing the beacon that is the Southern Cross! Shooting stars a plenty + Jupiter to steer by most of the night and Venus following for 3 hours before dawn
All good here with us and hopefully the same with all of you. We can definitely look forward to seeing most of you before Christmas now – just!
All the best from Olle and the rest of the crew of Sarah Jane
PS – we just caught another fish, but it got away. It was the size of a bus.