Back in Black
14 December 2011 | Canaries to Grenada
Rodney
We had the most remarkable Zen experience last night. Imagine this; you are surfing down a wave at 11 knots listening to AC/DC with the spinnaker up. The catamaran feels like a Porsche at that speed as you are focusing on hitting the next wave as it goes by - or in the words of George Surfer Bean - Linking waves. The waves are about 10 feet tall at their peaks so there is lots of fun to be had if you hit it right. Then out of the corner of your eye you see something jump. I ducked at first fearing a wayward kamikaze, but to my surprise they are too big. Then it happens again right in front of the boat - mind you I am surfing down a wave at 12 knots at this point. 10 dolphins jump at exactly the same time from the top of a wave and land in perfect unison in the trough of the next. Like something out of Marine World, they did it again. I screamed to the crew to come on deck! Now mind you that I have seen lots of dolphins from Fiji to Turkey, but never have I seen so many jump like this. A few of our new finned friends decided that surfing our bow wave was more fun than the dinner they were chasing, so they hung around for a bit. Eric Warren Miller Mears took this opportunity to grab the fish eye and race to bow to get some footage. Then, if that was not enough Eric lies on his back on the trampoline to get some good shots of the spinnaker. The trampoline is a great place to lie while you are at anchor, but mind you we are doing 11 knots now. Then as if all good deeds cannot go unpunished, he was greeted with a full frothy eruption from below - That will look great at the iMax. Luckily he put on the waterproof housing before he ran forward.
I am happy to announce we have a winner for the best joke award by unanimous decision - courtesy of Kim Bean - who is also an accountant! 3 engineers and an accountant, sailing in the middle of the Atlantic, stare dejectedly at the broken generator and scratch their heads. The civil engineer says, I think we can fix this thing if we build scaffolding and lift it out. The chemical engineer says, I can mix these ingredients from the galley, use my process drawings to pipe it over to the generator, and then blow it up. The electrical engineer says, we have to re-wire the whole electrical panel and re-solder all the connections. The accountant says, you are all making this too difficult. Amazon has one on sale with free super-saver shipping. Now, tell me what is the mailing address here?
PS. we are 950 miles way from Rum and Cokes!