Shouts of "fish on" filled the cockpit air Monday evening after dinner. A lovely mahi had taken the bait on Bruce's reel. Pelle used the gaff to haul it onboard and he and Bruce took charge to fillet the fish. They are hoping for another catch to supplement and make a tasty meal. More fish have hit the lures but drop off when reeled in close. Fellow ARC boats are posting beautiful photos of their catch so we know fish are out there and biting.

Tuesday's highlight was spotting a whale not too far from the boat, with a white face and smaller size. It was swimming on the surface catching krill no doubt. Not long after that we saw a large ray swim by doing lazy circles in the water with one wing tip held out of the water. We've had periods of motoring and periods of lovely sailing over very large but broad ocean swells. And another highlight was getting to take a shower! It's been quite warm on the water, warm in the boat and the simple pleasure of feeling less salty is hard to describe.

Charlie sends morning reports each day that gives us a way point to aim towards and what kind of conditions we might encounter. Many a groan as been uttered all week as the forecast has been and is for very light winds and lots of motoring. But we have put the crew through the paces hoisting light air sails, then taking them down, then putting out the pole with the jib, gybing with the pole (moving it to the other side of the boat). It's always surprising how much of a work out sail changes are on a heaving boat; it's wonderful to have all the help, and everyone is learning so quickly.

We have settled into our watch schedule of, 4 hours on/6 off, for each person, somewhat staggered, in that a new person comes on deck every two hours, so you split your shift with 2 separate people. For instance, I began my shift 8am-12 noon with Cecil for the first two hours, then at 10 am Bruce comes to relieve Cecil and I stay another 2 hours and am relieved by Mike who then spends 2 hours with Bruce.... It's quite the luxury to have 6 hours off to sleep, for me to cook, and to work on this blog.

Wednesday morning arrived after a lovely night sail with a jib poled out, and a steady breeze 12-15 knots, not much boat traffic to have to watch out for as the fleet has become scattered.The morning exercise was to gybe the pole and after doing so in a tired state, we noted that our state of charge for our batteries was quite low at 32% (everyone hates having the engine run but it charges our batteries) so it was definitely time to run the engine. Much to our shock, the engine ran for about 1 minute and sputtered out! Many attempts failed to start it and we all guessed that there might be an air lock in the fuel system as it did not appear that the engine was getting fuel, and we had plenty of fuel. Mike went to bleed the system and air did indeed bubble up but when he went to use the bulb pump to remove more air, it became "locked", stiff and unusable. Pelle and Mike searched for another way to bleed air, changed the filters, and examined hoses. We then turned to our Volvo contact in Las Palmas who has come to know us over the past several months. He was able to walk the guys through the system, Pelle followed the instructions, successfully getting the pump to bleed more air. Mike tightened all filters. We held our breath as we tried the engine and as it roared to life we were so relieved. It was especially important as the wind has left us now, with a light breeze of only 3 knots which won't move us anywhere. The instructions from Charlie were to motor sail for the next 2 days! Eventually the trade winds will fill in this weekend bringing 25-30 knots of wind, a different kind of excitement. Now we can only guess how our fuel got air into the system, although Mike has come up with a few ideas. We also learned the lesson in topping up our batteries before they dip below 50%.

Looks like another fish is on! It's so calm I did a load of wash using my machine!