A nice easterly came up at 3AM last night so we weighed anchor and set off for South Africa. The first twenty hours of sailing was great - calm seas, 10-15 knots of breeze from the NE and we averaged 7-8 kts. Unfortunately the wind died at about midnight, which we had expected, so we are now motoring.. Our strategy is to head due west until we hit the Mozambique current on the other side of the channel, where we will turn south and hopefully get a nice boost from the current.

We have a daily check-in with the other boats on the SSB and are also listening to a Net out of South Africa for boats en route from Madagascar and Mauritius. It sounds like most of the boats have been experiencing similar conditions - not much wind, especially in the afternoon and late at night. Although it could make for a longer than usual passage, it's much preferred to too much wind.