As I write this we are approaching a passage milestone: 1000 nm since we left Ascension Island 8 days ago and about 2000 nm to go to reach Grenada. 1/3 down, 2/3 to go!

This last day was what we expect to be typical for the next week or two. Periods of good sailing mixed with periods of squalls racing around and over us. With each squall we get bursts of rain. Sometimes it is just a mist, sometimes it is a deluge. When the rain is heavy, a neat thing happens. The heavy rains knock down the seas and they flatten down quite a bit.

A squall hit recently, right before the end of my 0600 to 0900 watch and right before the start of Mary's 0900 to 1200 watch. Thus, she was up at the helm with me as the winds hit and the rains started. I told her what was about to happen with the heavy rains and the flattening seas and she was shocked to see it happen. It is rather remarkable to behold.

During my watch we were hit with a couple of squalls. The first was just a glancing blow with a little rain and mild winds in the 20 to 22 knot winds. I was sailing by hand because I was running the generator and Otto chose to act up a bit to the voltage charge that the generator and battery charger were giving the battery bank. Even though the Raymarine tech in Cape Town has installed a DC/DC voltage regulator to our Raymarine electronics, one would never know it as periodically; the heading indicator and the wind indicator go whacko in response to the charging of the batteries. The result is Otto poops out and we have to take over and sail and steer by hand.

With my luck, during this period of charging and manual steering the two squalls decided it was time to visit us. With the second squall we briefly had winds of 35 knots. Steering was actually pretty easy but after two and ½ hours I was getting a little tired. At that time, and with Mary with me, watching and taking it all in, I was able to turn Otto on again and this time he decided to do his job.

As yesterday evening approached and while Mary Margaret and I were putting in our nightly reef in the mainsail, we noticed that the first reef line was chafing. The protective cover was chafed completely through, exposing the inside core. It is the core that provides the line strength. It was too late to switch out that line with a replacement one so we decided to just keep the mainsail fully up. If a nasty squall was to hit us, we would reef at that time. We usually don't do this because to reef during a squall means that the person or persons putting in the reef get wet since we have to work outside of the nice, dry bimini with its foul weather panels that keeps you snug as a bug in rug during storms.

We instructed Mary and Greg to call us if a squall hit and the true winds approach 25 knots. One or both of us would come up and throw in a reef or two, depending on the strength of the storm. As it turned out, both Mary and Greg did do some dancing with a couple of squalls but the winds were not too bad. During Greg's watch the generator was turned on and, once again, Otto started acting up. This is the same problem that our friend, Pascal, had during his recently completed transatlantic crossing starting from France and ending in BVI. When he emailed me about their problem with Otto, I asked him what electronics package his boat had. I should have known�...it also was Raymarine!

Greg ended up hand steering for about ½ hour before he was able to get Otto to take over and keep a decent course. I was envious�....

This late morning, with great winds and blue skies dotted with puffy white cumulus clouds we were able to switch out the chafed 1st reef line with a new one. We usually lose one or two reef lines to chafing during long passages. The chafed line has lasted over 2500 nm since we left Simons Town in South Africa. I will repair it and have it as a backup in case the new one starts to chafe. With 2000 nm to go, there is a good chance that will happen.

When the new reef line was in, I came down to the salon to be greeted by Mary Margaret and fresh, steaming hot loaves of bread that she had just made. Soon I was all smiles as I had sliced off two yummy pieces and slathered with fresh butter. OMG! It was fantastic!

As of noon today, the end of day 8 of our passage, our position was 4 19.3'S: 30 00.0'W, our course was 274, our speed was 6.5 kts with 14 kts of apparent wind. The seas were in the 2 to 3 meter range, running from the ESE. We made 125 nm with an average speed of just 5.2 knots. At noon we had made 988 nm since leaving Ascension Island and we are just 145 nm shy of Fernando de Noronha. We hope to get behind the lee of the island before dusk tomorrow so I can go up the mast to replace the starboard lazy jack. We will not be stopping because our fuel consumption has only been 35 gallons of diesel so far and we still have 205 gallons on board. Our average speed for this passage is still only 5.1 knots.