The last 24 hours have been LUMPY!! The wind that got up with us last night has stayed for the last day. It’s meant we have banged in some decent miles, but we were being tossed around a bit. Again, not complaining as it’s well within Nautilus’s capabilities, but wasn’t nearly as comfortable as the first few days. It does bring it home to you when you’re watching the wind speed increase and know that there isn’t any shelter to run to, so you have to be planning to manage the situation. In the end, the wind topped out at 30 knots so we took it easy. We went to 3 reefs to not stress things out as we’re not racing. The main thing was that the wind created a fairly vicious short-sharp sea, so you’d occasionally get thumped by a big wave. It did cause me to spill by coffee all over the sofa.
Things have eased off now and we’re down to about 15 knots. I’m waiting for Tates to wake up after her watch so we can shake out the reefs and pick up the pace. (extra update – just gone back to full sail and we’re up to 7.5 knots boat speed and up to 11knt with the current!!).
Dolphins!! The first sighting of our trip, they were in full hunting mode, so we only caught glimpses of them and their silvery prey as they took it in turns to leap out of the water and break up the infinite ocean vista.
And in other news, we are properly into the current we wanted to hitch a lift on.. The best we have seen so far is 3knots (right now), so it’s giving us a real speed boost towards our destination. As you can see, we’re going to try and stay in the current as long as possible before we start dropping south to French Polynesia.
Otherwise the last few hours were spent cleaning up Boobie poop, making a quiche and banana bread under Tates’ instructions and doing a bit of work. Got passed by a ship too, so it’s nice to know there are other people around.
4 years ago today we officially bought Nautilus! I’m not quite sure that as we sat on the banks of the Thames sipping our chilled glasses of Veuvev and toasting our new purchase, that we quite realised what a life altering decision we had made. Nautilus has become more than just our floating home, she has opened our eyes to a world we could never have imagined, she had lead us on crazy adventures to far flung places, some that I had never heard of. But most importantly she has allowed us to cross paths with some of the most amazing people, people who have enriched our lives and taught us what it really means to live, people who have shared their homes, their stories, their love and their cultures with us. People who we would never have met had we stayed, sitting on the banks of the Thames drinking champagne.
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I wonder what kind of a ship that was? An odd shape, very long and thin
Loving these updates and great to hear the adventure continues.