Northern Light II - Thursday 30th November

Skipper apologises yesterday that he forgot to mention the name of the fish that was eaten by the shark - it was a Wahoo.

As we move towards Grenada the temperatures on board have become hotter and more humid. The crew now spend their days in swim wear and trying to find ways to stay cool inside the boat, particularly when trying to sleep between shifts. A cold shower provides some relief but it’s short lived. Winds are improving and the threatened squalls seem to dodge us. Much time is spent in watching clouds to assess their direction of movement. Patricia has been flown overnight and today. With stronger and consistent trade winds (15 knots average) we have achieved an average of 7.3 knots today with 379 mies to go.

Geertje”s neighbour and friend, with the help of her family, wrapped up a series of little parcels for her to open throughout the trip. These have provided much intrigue and vicarious enjoyment for the rest of the crew. The gifts all contain instructions on when they should be opened. Some have been for arrival and departure from Las Palmas and Cape Verde. Others have been for moments of sadness, homesickness or boredom. The fairy lights that adorn the deck are one of the gifts that she received and today she opened a box of lego to build a flower and the game connect 4. The latter provided Cat and G with many hours of entertainment and competition this morning.

The fish continue to elude Skipper and Tom despite both of them waking up this morning with novel ideas to tweak the equipment and bring about success. The good news is that they still have the penultimate hook but the bad news is that there are still no fish. In the meantime Sarah decided to open the fishing book and became distracted by the lovely boat recipes at the back. We have a caponata in the freezer still awaiting the first catch and wasabi and soy to make sashimi. Could we be the only yacht that catches nothing?

The clocks have been turned back twice and there’s one more time change to make which we will do on arrival.

Until tomorrow

Sarah