GHOST

Day 13 in the Big Bruvva house...... (please add imaginary well known Scottish accent while reading this). Brad is on the helm, Kat has just sent our position report, Heather has just finished her 'mother watch duties' for the morning, Caroline is on the winches and Stefano is liberally applying sun screen in what can only be seen as an effort to prevent him seemingly tanning before our eyes, and I'll have to settle for the navigation desk and laptop as being most akin to the Diary Room. Now we just need a nutty left wing politician sipping from a cat bowl and a heavily pregnant presenter talking inanely and the picture would be complete...

So since Brad's last blog on Day 10, we have well and truly passed the half way mark. After deciding to head further South on Day 11 to pick up some stronger winds, our faith in weather forecasts was re-affirmed (!) when it duly dropped to the lightest we have had on the crossing so far. We quickly set about putting up the gennaker, but a slight snag as it went up quickly meant it was sent to our onboard surgeon and the skipper for some adept patching in the forward cabin. While the rest of the crew got busy enjoyed the morning sun, Kat ensured the pressure was kept firmly on the pair, with the looming deadline of having it flying well before lunch! Our deadline duly achieved, by midday we had it flying well and Ghost settled on a good Westerly course. The wind continued to drop down to 8-10 knots, and with the gennaker flying stably under auto-pilot and the sea becoming ever calmer, we settled in to our quietest night so far, after a fantastic meal cooked by Heather.

This morning the wind has picked up to close to 20 knots and we're making good 8-9 knot progress towards St Lucia. With close to two weeks now under our belt, and no news from the outside world, topics of conversation obviously become ever more high brow. By 9am it is not uncommon for musings about what exactly dinner would be to be heard and by mid-afternoon discussions of whether to have for breakfast the next day a cereal bar, or go wild and have a full bowl of cereal with milk. Weighty subjects indeed... That said, now we are firmly within the last 1000, and with daily updates from Kat on the positions of our competitors, much debate is being had on our best course to make, and how best to increase our boat speed to make sure we continue working our way up our class. Hopefully this will continue to pay off and we'll soon be able to report a positive result upon our arrival.

So the internal sweepstake of arrival times is: Brad: Afternoon on day 18 Kat: Afternoon on day 17 Stefano: Afternoon on day 17 Caroline: Morning on day 19 Jay Morning on day 17 Heather: Evening on day 17

And the picture is the GHOST crew doing a "plank off"! Heather won - hardcore.