We had a very fast rough night. The wind piped up to 20 to 25 knots with 6 foot seas. You can imagine what it is like to sail a catamaran when you have a wave blasts between the pontoons below your feet. It is a very scary sound but the mighty Azure II is holding together well. Both Jamie and Victor seem to be suffering from a little sea sickness, but only Victor decided to give my famous curry chicken to sea. The strong winds mean that we are making very good time. In our first 24 hours we have done 180 miles.

Day break was a pleasant surprise with azure blue water and pieces of Sargasso Seaweed floating by the boat. The winds are 15 knots now and out of the east and the seas have calmed down to about 3 feet. The boat has a great motion through the water and we are doing a comfortable 8 knots.

Unfortunately the fast and rough seas bring some boat problems. The first casualty was our fishing lewer. Victor was watching a Dorado jumping out of the water after some flying fish when the reel started spinning on our fishing pole - oh well the fish won. Next the lacing that holds our trampoline between the pontoons started to come undone. Victor and I braved the elements and took a seawater shower while lacing it back up. The last thing was our American flag and pole - it is floating somewhere 100 miles north of the BVI's

Our weather window is closing very fast. A large high pressure system usually sits between Bermuda and the Azores. The high is typically fully developed by this time of the year so you can enjoy steady Northeast winds all the way to Bermuda - we do not have that luxury. A small high pressure system is moving over Bermuda that will bring 20 knots of wind from the north. We are changing course now to make as much easterly as possible. This will enable us to head northwesterly and reach into Bermuda in the last 24 hours. We are so grateful for our grib files that we download over the ham radio. Without them we would be sailing by brail.