L'Eau Commotion Westabout

Day 60 8pm Tuesday 6th August 2019 ( UTC +3 )
On the wind which was increasing during the night so first reef, second reef and at dawn the jib furled and storm staysail set. Solid going but comfortable enough under the circumstances. At 10:30 the little AIS chirped up and in short order I seemed to have most of the Korean fishing fleet strung out in a line just barely to my lee. With the wind above 25 knots and poor visibility due to the quite large swell and smokey atmospherics I kept peering out expecting to see an armada with me in its sights for an extra bounty. Eventually I worked out what the situation was. The mother ship on her deck or somewhere had at least 10 AIS beacons, some marked as net beacons, some with a doctored MMSI number, all turned on. Now with these Class B transmitters they only send out a position every six minutes so they were leaving a false trail which I skilfully avoided by just ignoring them. When the quite large factory style trawler finally popped up out of the swell all the AIS decided to sing in chorus from the hold of the ship and I brewed a much needed mocha. I am told I am going to be becalmed this evening which from the odd flap of the not long set jib I can well believe.