End of Day 14 Beaufort NC USA towards Guernsey

This Blog entry is an edited version of the message we sent back whilst we were on the passage.  The original, without pictures, was sent by radio with a laptop that controls a modem connected to the HF/SSB radio.  With that set up we can contact one of the SailMail stations to send the daily text message to my daughter Charlotte in Guernsey who then forwards it on to a list of family members.

2359hrs (O, GMT -2) Thu 11 Jun 2020

Dear All,

Nicky writes:

Well, we've been really rather poor at putting pen to paper or fingers to keyboard today. The night watches last night were dark, very dark.  There's still quite a lot of moon but it rises after midnight now and overnight last night there was a lot of cloud cover so even when the moon was up little of its light came through.  It did do a good job of backlighting the altocumulus clouds though so that there were areas that were pale and shimmering and areas that were darker, giving the sky the appearance of a crushed velvet cloth.  And in the darkness the phosphorescence in the sea was clear to see and BV trailed a long milky-white wake with the odd sparkling flash.  On some nights the flashes of phosphorescence are so numerous that it almost looks like starlight in the water but last night's 'white wake' phosphorescence was more subtle.

A damp and grey start to the day

The day dawned damp and grey and pretty much stayed that way. Overnight, as forecast, the wind had dropped right off and it has remained light all day (and it still is quite light, only about 10kts).  For most of the day we ghosted along at 4.5 knots in 8 knots of wind with a small amount of help from the North Atlantic Current.  Happily, the waves reduced overnight along with the wind, so we've been able to keep sailing on smooth seas.  Had the large swell remained we might have had the light airs shaken from the sails as we were pushed along on and rolled on the swell.

Rich and gooey chocolate fudge brownies will certainly provide a sugar fix with our late morning coffee

I spent most of my morning watch working through the backlog of calculations of my astronav sights and, so far, it looks as if the GPS has been pretty accurately agreeing with the sun as to our location!  Reg spent his afternoon watch baking bread and chocolate fudge cake, the latter more successfully than the former today, I think.  He's been adding extra yeast as well as his sour dough starter to the bread mix, but tried with just the sour dough starter today but found that the dough didn't rise as well as it normally does.  

Maybe not Reg’s best loaf: taste test and official verdict at breakfast tomorrow

When using a sour dough starter there should be no need to add extra yeast, but he's not exactly producing bread in the perfect environment here:  there's a salt-laden atmosphere to upset the yeast; the cabin's not terribly warm anymore and we don't have a proving oven; and he's using something close to 'normal' plain flour (not strong, bread-making flour) because that's all I could buy in Honduras.  We’ll do a proper taste test on the bread at breakfast tomorrow for an official verdict! 

As I write, the wind, as forecast, has veered to the west.  I've just spent an hour or so gybing the boat and sorting everything out so that we continue on our northeasterly heading.  By morning we expect the wind to go northerly and to increase, at which point we'll head off to the east, probably for a good few days until the next ridge of high pressure arrives and becalms us.

And that's all the news from here for now.

Love to all,

Reg and Nicky

Passage statistics:

Position at midday 11 Jun: N43 47 W038 16

Position at midnight 11 Jun: N44 21 W037 06

Midday to midday distance through water: 145 nautical miles (average 6.0 knots).

Midday to midday GPS distance towards destination: 151 nautical miles

Midnight to midnight distance through water: 124 nautical miles (average 5.2 knots)

Midnight to midnight GPS distance towards destination: 130 nautical miles

Total miles covered through water: 2234 nautical miles

Approximate distance to go (GPS route to Guernsey): 1469 nautical miles

End of Day 14 Beaufort, North Carolina, USA towards Guernsey