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Albatross - Dec 8 - 19th Day at Sea



Dec 8 - 19th Day at Sea

All is well. We are 506 miles from St Lucia, and Las Palmas is 2,187 miles behind us.

We continue our course of 278° with winds coming from 80°-100° at 15-19 knots. We are flying the main with one reef and half the jib.

The news of the day? We jibbed! Although technically it was not the "macho" 60° jibe we do when we race close to land, where the boom swings from port to starboard. What we did is called a "chicken jibe", a slow 300° tack, to avoid having the boom swing.

The one difficulty today has been the waves. They are 10-15 feet and seem to come from everywhere. The boat has been rocking up and down for hours. At dinner time, while cooking and serving the food, two of the six portions of beef ribs with spinach flew up and ended up on the floor. Kevin, the chef, looked like a ping pong ball down on the galley and, when a big wave hit the boat, the garlic he had so carefully chopped landed on the opposite side of the boat. I did not know that finely sliced garlic could stick to walls and doors. An impressive property for those trying to fend off vampires!

We got another flying fish tonight. This time a high jumper. He bounced on our spray-hood and lodged himself behind it, startling us with his frantic movements. He seemed to have a death wish, but we managed to catch him and threw him overboard. The one that was not so lucky was the one that jumped on the bow. We found him too late, during our daily rig inspection. We have been leaving a pair of rubber coated gloves on the cockpit to catch flying fish. Perhaps we should switch to a racket.

Now that we are approaching St Lucia all boats start to converge. We have been sailing the whole day with two other sailboats, Serenity, seven miles from us on our starboard side, and Sundance, eleven miles on our port.

We are making good progress. Today we sailed 149 miles. If conditions continue this way we will arrive on Monday the 12. Now that we are four days from St Lucia, the impatience of arriving and seeing our families is mixed with the sadness of the adventure ending.

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