Raritan - Raritan – 11/26/18 – Day Two

Monday morning dawned clear with a fresh breeze. During the early morning, we saw the wind drop to 5-8 knots and motor sailed for a few hours. By sunrise, the wind was back in the teens. We tried sailing wing and wing with the genoa to sail deeper angles, but could not keep the sail stable. In the afternoon we set the spinnaker.
Raritan sailed beautifully, and our speeds were in the 8-9 knots with 16-18 knots of wind. Spirits were high, the weather is terrific! Winds built in the late afternoon, and after a mild round-up, we decided to dowse the spinnaker around 5:30. After a bit of struggle keeping the spinnaker from wrapping around the headsails, we succeeded in getting it onto the deck and in its snuffer.
Rob prepared a green salad with pasta and meat sauce for dinner in the cockpit, outstanding! We enjoyed a bottle of red wine with it, so much the better. The sun set and Matt observed a huge green flash! He had been skeptical that it existed until then. Night fell and we found conditions much darker than the previous night, with a more confused sea state. Steering low was difficult, as few visual references were present.
Doug