13 June 2011
Hmm. Wind on the nose, and I'm feeling inexperienced in the navigation. We have been given the details of a weather router - Karsten, a Dane living in Panama, who gives us weather and current updates on a daily basis, which is really useful. He also has a net but I haven't been able to hear him yet as the radio is not 100% working! I have however, had success at contacting another ship, who relayed a message to our friends Gruffalo, so a partial success! Anyway, as I was saying, with these long passages, do I do really long tacks heading way away from our destination first? Or do I do shorter tacks, almost doubling our mileage? One thing is for sure - we've had to turn the engines off as we wouldn't have enough diesel to motor the whole way! If we weren't picking Whit up again for crew and we weren't delivering a parcel to another yacht who had to leave Panama before it had arrived, I would just relax a little and accept the fact that it will take us longer. That's what I am supposed to do, but when you are doing 3 knots in the wrong direction, it gets a little frustrating. Well, that's what sailing is all about, as I am sure I would be told by the experienced - all part of the fun. On a lighter note, we've had a swallow tailed gull with bright red legs and eye hitchhike on our boat all day, which has kept Lochy and Mia amused for a while! Not much more to report, so over and out (just to wind up those who know you don't say over AND out at the same time!
Current location: 03.55N 80.05W (I know I know, not much progress in the past 24 hours!)