We now have 155miles to go - yes! Well over half way!! Arrival is still looking like Sunday late afternoon and no news about if we will be allowed off the boat until inspection Monday morning or if they can do inspection Sunday. I have checked our supplies and aside from that bottle of Corona we still have a couple of bottles of wine and as yet unwatched dvds if that be the case.

We hits some sqalls at midnight just as my 4 hour shift was ending. Given we don't want to be bumped around in our current condition I stayed on the helm. Winds speeds got up to 22knots a few times with lots of rain. I carefully navigated to keep our stern to the weather with the mainsail centred and engine revs way down. As the sea was flat this seemed to be the best option. We just moved gently with the sea for the time. We have had the sea anchor ready to deploy from the bow in a moments notice should the sea state get large enough to require it. Fortunately it has not been necessary yet. Coincidently we had two tankers pass by our stern while this was all happening. No ships all day and then 2 in the middle of a squall. 2 hours or so later the squalls had passed or rained themselves out or do whatever squalls do - there were none to be seen on the radar - so it was time to wake Nicky, put on a fresh set of dry dirty clothes and go to my bunk for 4 or 5 hours.

I was just at the point where I was about to doze off when bang right next to my head, then bang again further away. Two loud thuds resonated through the hull. I know the first one was on the bow and close to my head. I was horrified if the seond one had been the rudder. I sprinted up ondeck grabbing the spot light as I went and managed to catch sight of the culprit. A huge white garbage bag with god knows what inside. Nicky heard it and thought it was not a good noise. I then checked the steering - seemed ok. Ran down below to check the blige and inside the cofferdam I built around the initial tear. No water. Put my hand on varous parts of the hulls and inspected the steering below. All seemed fine. Don't know where the 2nd noise came from but if it did indeed hit the rudder it had no effect. As the debris was fairly bouyant my guess it only hit the hull.

With that I went back to my bunk and slept soundly.

I called a new contact this morning on Yap. His name is Arthor, he is a fisherman and his brother works for Wayne's business. He has negotiated a very reasonable fee with the Yap Fisheries to haul the boat out, keep her in dry dock and put her back in. He is also offerring the use of his power tools. As the head of the Fisheries will be out of town when we arrive we won't be able to pull the boat out until Wednesday. So maybe I'll really get some forced R & R as there is little I can do while the boat is still in the water. Yesterday was the first time in the entire trip I was able to do any reading. It will also give me time to replot a course back to Australia. I had hoped to visit friends in the Solomon Islands but due to our nearly 4 weeks in Faralup, another 2 weeks in Yap and this 800 mile detour I have run out of time.

The photo: We were given Frangipani Marmars (flower headbands) as farewell gifts by the children prior to departure and the photo is of our Marmars being thrown in the sea after we passed the reef as an offering to the local god of Faraleup, Uwappi. We joked with locals who are now all catholic that perhaps Uwappi is just their name for the Holy Spirit. :) They thought that was a convenient excuse to still believe in him. Though Nicky is convinced that Thomas with all his capabilities and benevolance is the reincarnation of Uwappi. I just think it is wonderful as human beings from different backgrounds we can combine our religious heritiges and not get too hung up about it all.

David