DAY 1 TRANSATLANTIC CANARIES TO CARIBBEAN
04 December 2009 | 145 nautical miles south of Gran Canaria
Blue skies
We left Las Palmas marina in Gran Canaria last night at 5pm UTC and headed south. Danny and his crew on Regina decided to wait til this morning to leave but we expect they'll catch us up fairly quickly since the boat is 64ft and will therefore have much better boat speed. We've had a great day and put 145 nautical miles behind us travelling at an average of 6 knots and with good winds at our backs. It was a bit lumpy around the island but once we were free of it the seas were better. Of course our SSB radio now won't tune which means we can hear everyone else but we are really faint to them. We'll go through all its connections and see if we can fix it. Sam's finally opened the box to the model Cutty Sark, a famous old clipper ship, and we've started putting it together so that should be fun...very fiddly though. Total passage is 2,785 nautical miles to St Maartens toward the top of the Caribbean. Only 2,640 to go which should take roughly 18-19 days if we're averaging 6 knots and that of course depends on the wind.