Our new sails are ready (in Sri Lanka) and are just about to be shipped. They are suggesting about 9 days for shipping – we watch and wait. Today’s photo shows our new sails lying on the floor of the sail loft. The main and genoa are made of a material called Hydranet, which contains a dyneema thread woven into the material. This makes it very strong and low stretch. It is also a lighter material for its strength, which makes overall sail handling easier. These sails are tri-radial cut, with pieces of material radiating out from all three corners, which gives better shape and better sailing performance. The stay-sail (not photographed) is made from standard heavy Dacron and built in horizontal strips. The stay-sail is designed for heavy weather conditions so is designed more for survival than performance.

Progress today included completion of all the internal wiring modifications needed for the new solar panels and their controllers. We are adding quite a bit of power, so we need to make sure the wiring is big enough to take it – which it now is. The panels are here now, so we will head back to Papeete on Monday to collect them and start the installation. Our new rigging is now complete – barring one small item on the new furler that will be installed on Tuesday. And our new sprayhood will be trial fitted first thing on Monday.

We are feeling good about progress today and have headed to anchor out on the reef for the weekend, to chill.