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Adagio - A Routine? Really?



Seems we've made it! I lost track of what day of the week it was, but not what time everyone's shift is supposed to start :)
That's a really good sign.
We are down to the point that we have most of the routine things down pretty well. We make position notifications via SPOT Tracker to our interested friends and family, I've been posting a couple of little items on my Facebook account using the YellowBrick App and we pretty faithfully remember to turn on (and off!!) our running lights each day (oh come on, you know you've forgotten to turn them off too ... haven't you?) Dinner and breakfast times are pretty consistent, and consistently good (thank you soooo much, Robin!) and the sleep periods are actually becoming pretty restful. All in all, it seems like this crossing will be a very good one oif the forecasts hold out.

Today, with the "light" winds, we decided to try a few different sail combinations to see what might produce the best sailing conditions for us. Dead downwind with the light air sail poled out? Dead downwind with the larger but heavier Genoa poled out? Running wing-on-wing? or running slightly off of dead downwind with the light air sails sheeted out. We are keeping track of our VMG (velocity made good) and then we couple that with an expected time of arrival(ETA)in order to see if any combination is particularly advantageous. Since I still get to claim that both Robin and I are relatively new to this long distance sailing thing, it is a learning experience to hang and douse the different sails as well as to set the Amel Pole system up to run downwind.
What we finally decided after today's experimentation is that we like the nicer ride of sailing just off of dead downwind, even if we are not going precisely toward our destination. I think the fact that we have lots of room to wander and plenty of time to experiment is wonderful and we will still (well, we ~should~ still) be arriving in a normal amount of time.

Can't say enough about nice the weather has been for the last two days! I hope it holds up like this all the way to Horta!

Oh, and we're planning a SPA day for the ladies aboard when we get there contingent upon a couple of things... 1: Can we find one and B: is the schedule open. Should be fun!

Gary
Adagio



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