It's been a very mellow day today -- no wind and a calm sea. We have had our daily dolphin visitors this morning but I think that they were more interested in eating fish than playing with the boat. The large number of sea birds in the area would also suggest that fish may have been plentiful. We are currently about 120Nm WSW of Brest in an area known as La Chapelle Bank. The depth gauge is beginning to drop now and is currently sitting at about 176 metres of ocean beneath us. In about three hours time, we will have passed over the edge of the continental shelf where the depth plummets at this point to about 2,100 metres. This is a place not to be in a rough sea as the waves from the North Atlantic heap up and trip over themselves at the shelf. There's no danger of that today as we have been motoring for the past 30 hours as there has been about 3 knots of wind from variable directions, insufficient to move Quasar IV along under sail. The sun is out against a beautiful blue sky and sea and I feel that we now really heading to where the sun shines at long last. The new engine seems to be hanging on in well and is burning about 1.6 litres of fuel an hour during which time we travel about 5 Nm. As we set off with 360 litres on board, we should be able to motor over 1,000 Nm and NW Spain is only about 450 Nm, so looking good so far if we get no wind which seems quite likely looking at the forecast. After last week's horrendous conditions, the calm sea is very welcome, albeit some wind would be welcome now so we can actually do some sailing! Also, the boat travels faster under sail than with the engine, as long as you can still head in a reasonable direction of course... The Crew are OK albeit with some sea sickness and neck joint problems but hopefully the sight of Spain in a few days and the thought of an ice cold beer in La Coruna may keep the chins up. Dinner tonight is chicken in white sauce, sweetcorn and rice, one of my favourite quick dinners, easy to cook in any sea state, followed by the usually after dinner coffee for those who can keep it down!