Tuesday, 14 February 2012

DAY 21

Position: 14:47.82N 52:24.57W

The sun comes up…the sun goes down……

And still PW charges westwards, and today he’s been given a shove by a boisterous sea eager no doubt to be rid of us. All things head west here. Our daily routine now so firmly established there’s no changes of note, but sitting midships feet just above the water armed with a boathook I finally managed to hook some of this floating Atlantic weed that has been prevalent for hundreds of miles. The colour of horse flies, it has normal looking leaves plus flotation bags along the stems similar to mistletoe, and tiny threadlike thingies in amongst the leaves. I put it in a bucket of seawater for Alfie to examine when he got up, tied up the bucket so it couldn’t tip, and the next time we looked there wasn’t any water in it at all but still upright. Odd. We wondered if it would be edible, but declined the obvious test.

We reckon we should be in Barbados by Saturday, with 440 miles to run as of now. PW has been kicking around most of the day with a cross swell from the SE causing extra rolling, so apart from cleaning duties in the galley, nothing much extra has been achieved. The clocks went back another hour recently, with one more to go as we reach Barbados, and as that caused a slight upset on the evening meal time - which is easier if its in daylight - we moved that forward half an hour to accommodate, so we could fully appreciate the steak and kidney we enjoyed tonight! Nothing to do with being hungry, of course.

Noises: you lot will think unkindly of us no doubt, but we’ve both agreed that the sinks talk. The one in the heads speaks very gently and always finishes with a note rise rather like Aussies do, making it sound like a question. It says things like, really? Two o’clock? Just you? Blimey. All in perfect English. And that’s not all. Archie (self steering) talks all the time too. Today I woke up, and a cockerel crowed. I said to Alfie, ‘there’s a cockerel crowing’ and he said ‘yes, it’s Archie’. The sink in the cabin sounds like what you might hear in an Ops room, with people talking in the background saying things like ‘Roger’, ‘over’, ‘OK then’. Alfie thinks its rather nice..

That’s not all. We both have felt that there was a third presence on board, and end up doing ridiculous things like creep around the cabin in case you wake them when you know full well the only other person is up on deck driving. We reckon that it was the ’third man’ who emptied the bucket with the seaweed in it.

Perhaps we’ve been at sea too long. Still no mermaids though..

Hi Family and chums, my brief message tonight is to close your doors and windows before you go surfing. After Niges efforts at surfing the waves with PW a week or so ago, I thought it was my turn. Last night at 0130 the wind and sea got up a treat and soon PW was off on the surf, yee ha. We got up to 7.5 - 8 knots before I realised we were in a viscous squall. Then the rain started and from inside Nige shouted "is it raining"? "Just a bit" says I. By now I am rushing to close the cabin up and get a reef in, in rain I haven't seen since I was an Ordinary Seaman (OD) 2nd class in Singapore in 1968. Talk about stair rods, Bottom half of me is soaked in a few minutes and the top half is feeling like an OD again. Pride hurt, no other damage done and though we don't have a spin dryer, we do have hot air blowers for drying kit!! Take care chums, it's sing along with Nige night on PW (hope no one can hear us)