Ah, the sound of a bottle of Champagne opening for the equator crossing ceremony. We made it from the Southern Hemisphere into the Northern Hemisphere on Saturday at 14:56 UTC/GMT, four minutes before our local noon. We made the crossing at 042 degrees 43.4 minutes west. We have sailed 4442 nautical miles and have another 3115 nautical miles to go to Annapolis.

We are currently heading for a waypoint off the coast of Suriname, sticking to the continental shelf to make the most of the current, before we start heading for the channel south of the island of St Lucia and then on to Tortola, the capital island of the British Virgin Islands. We will be making a short stop there to take on fresh water and fuel for the 1400 odd nautical mile last leg to Annapolis. We should arrive in Tortola on September 23, all going well.

Over the past few days we have sailed with the Genoa tacked out only and did some good daily runs in winds ranging from 15 knots to 35 knots. Shortly after crossing the equator, the wind started to drop and we had a great sail under spinnaker, averaging over 8 knots in the six hours we had it up. Unfortunately, the moon is busy waning and we only have moonrise in the early hours of the morning, meaning that we had to take the spinnaker down and sail on the genoa through the night, putting it up again at 3am. This boat sails very well with the spinnaker but once the wind goes over 16 knots apparent, down it must come.

Today (Monday September 14) we have so little wind that we are motor-sailing to try and get more north west so that we can pick up the trades again. So, basically, we are in the ITCZ or doldrums as the old sailors used to call the area.

It is cooking hot on board at the moment, a sharp contrast to the freezing cold we experienced after leaving Cape Town. However, this has not stopped Andries from baking two great looking loaves of bread, one of which will be consumed in a short while for lunch. Andries has been excelling in his cooking ability, making the most wonderful dinners from my collection of recipes which I have in my "little black book" and on my laptop.

In the next 24 hours we are going to have some change in our environment. If you click on the Shiptrak link on the right of this page, you will be taken to a web page with a map of the world and you will see that our latest local noon position is off the Amazon Delta. Well, this little river has quite a flow into the sea and the brown water has such force as it enters the ocean, that the flow goes a few hundred miles out to sea, turning the water from a turquoise blue to a muddy brown, which is carried by the current right up into the Caribbean Sea. It is quite a sight to see on a satellite photograph and is just as amazing to actually sail in the brown waters.

I hope you all had a great weekend and a good week ahead. Regards from the three of us aboard A4001 - John.