One thing you notice sailing at night in the mid latitudes in summer is that the glow of twilight never completely goes away. If you were standing at the Antarctic Circle at midnight of the solstice yesterday, you would have seen the sun just above the horizon, directly south, over the pole. Even here at 35 degrees south, on a dark moonless night like tonight you can just see thin grey light directly south, which is neither the sunset twilight nor the dawn twilight but the midsummer night's polar glow. As the night progresses, the glow moves towards the eastern horizon, and the dawn of a new day.

We are barreling along on a reach at over seven knots under dim stars tonight. Today was another very pleasant day of sailing on a sparkling sea,I finally saw an albatross (Robin seems to see them daily). An uncommonly large seabird just floating on the sea. The wind filled in enough to shut off the engine by 0900, and slowly increased all day. By the night watch tonight, I had to reef.

Robin has knit us both really nice Christmas hats! They are useful even here in the Southern Hemisphere summer - ocean nights are still quite chilly!

Posting late tonight as an active helm has kept me busy. Dark clouds have rolled in, though not squally looking.