28th January

12 22.045 N
68 19.208 W

Weather; sunny, wind 10 - 15 knots E, waves 4-8 feet

Here we are at day 3 after yet another sleep deprived night, we will get into the swing of the watches just in time to arrive at our destination!
My apologies to anyone reading the last 3 blogs and wondering if I have lost my mind, they have been written in the most awkward of situations, rolling and being thrown all over the boat whilst trying to type, I'm tired and forgetful and I have had to post them via the satellite phone which doesn't allow me to go back in and edit anything so if they don't make any sense you might have to re -read them after I have access to an internet connection and can edit and revise some of the drivel I have written!
The good news today, well sort of, is that the weather has calmed down a whole heap, enough that we have been able to shower today and change our clothes so we no longer stink! The wind began to drop around mid- morning and we are currently getting around 12-15 knots coming at us from almost directly behind, the down side to that is that we have slowed down a little and are now only managing 6.5 knots but that's OK at least we are moving along in the right direction. The waves and swell have also dropped away and are now at only about 4 feet making it a much more pleasant ride with less rolling and crashing from side to side.
I think we have just about caught up with our sleep now, having taken naps as we have needed them throughout the day, so the thinking should get a bit clearer - no promises here though.
We saw our first dolphins late this morning, playing across the front of our bow before disappearing from sight. We have also seen a couple more ships today - obviously getting closer to civilization, though they are all travelling away from us.
Gerry was keen enough to put the fishing stick out today, so far it has done nothing except decorate the port rail, good job I have some beef casserole out for dinner!
Well the day panned out slightly differently to how we expected, we caught nothing for dinner on the fishing stick - Chris and Helen I can hear you laughing from here!
As we dipped into the night the wind did as predicted ( shock horror - they got it right for a change!) and dropped right off and came around to our stern. We battled to keep moving along under sail alone with light winds which dropped to about 8- 10knots, the sea also calmed right down and we were now seeing waves of just under 3 feet and not quite so violent. Of course our average speed also took a hammering dropping to 4.5 - 5 knots so much so that Gerry let both reefing points out of the main and we tried to sail with a full main and the jib flying. We were moving along but not as quickly as we would have wanted. We ate dinner without it missing our mouths - quite a feat at times I can assure you! And then it was time to begin the night watches with Gerry deciding to try and sleep first. He had been down about an hour and a half when the wind began to wrap even further around and was now coming from our port stern quarter making the sailing impossible without moving the
sails. I very reluctantly called him from his bed and said that I thought we needed to jibe so that the main sail could fly with the wind which was now coming from the opposite side. It would have been pretty near impossible for me to do the jibe alone as it required someone to take the preventer off at the bow, raise the boom so it cleared the dodger and move the running backstay out of the way in order to be able to swing the boom across to the starboard side. This is the point of night sailing that I hate so much - someone (and it's never me) has to go out on deck in the dark to make this happen! Gerry is really good at getting up from sleep and coping with whatever crap I'm presenting him with, he donned his life jacket, attached the harness and head lamp and made his way out on to the deck to do all the stuff I've just talked about whilst I manned the helm and responded to his instructions as best I could. I'm not the most intuitive sailor and it sometimes takes me a while to get the instructions right but we got there in the end without me sending the boom crashing into Gerry's head and knocking him overboard. I wish I could say it made all the difference but the wind was now becoming so light that we were down to 4 knots, but we were still moving along in the right direction. Gerry tried to go back to sleep, failed miserably and ended up sending me down to see if I could manage a bit of sleep, I went into the forward berth as he was going to start the engine up to give us a boost along. I spent the next 3 hours telling myself that I needed to sleep, eventually getting back up and returning to the cockpit. As we were now motor sailing we managed to keep the speed at around 5.5 knots - good enough to see us arriving into Curacao in the early morning. We were on track and on time so it was all good for now, tomorrow I will be blogging from Curacao!