Crossing the Atlantic Ocean (Day 4)

With the Christmas and Boxing Day festivities over we have switched back to concentrating on the proper business of crossing the Atlantic. The wind eased overnight and so, after breakfast, we shook out a reef in the mainsail. By 11am the wind had dropped further so we shook out the other 2 reefs too so we are now under full sail. We’ve even gybed, partly because the wind has moved around to the ESE and partly to enable us to head a little further south in an attempt to minimise the time we will spend in an area of light winds forecast ahead of us in a few days’ time.

The sky remains obscured by cloud and so we have not been able to take any astro nav sights nor are we doing any active fishing because the fridge is still full of food. That said, 6 flying fish leapt onto the deck overnight of which we think that we got 3 back into the sea alive. With the sky overcast, the sea and sky are unremitting shades of grey. It’s almost like we are sailing in the English Channel…. Just a lot warmer. The air temperature is about 25 degrees C and the sea temperature a little higher  - up at 26 degrees Celsius now.

Our midday position report request to Jitano came to nothing and so I suspect that they are now outside of VHF range. We’ll keep trying each day. We haven’t sighted any other yachts or ships for abut 24 hours now, even on AIS, and the visibility is still just a couple of miles.

The Christmas tree provides great night illumination for the saloon; very snug    

The other significant event which happens tonight is that we will be at 1500 nm to go to the Barbados waypoint; ¼ of the passage completed!

Position at 0001 Thu 28 Dec: N16 14 W033 55
Distance run 1159-1159: 159nm
Distance run 2359-2359: 154nm
Distance run so far: 527nm
Distance to waypoint (just N of Barbados): 1500nm

End of Day 4 position