We took only 11 days for the 2100 mile crossing, burning no diesel except to charge the batteries and keep the freezer cold.
The average speed of 190 miles/day is our best to date. There is a favourable current, which probably explains 10 to 20 miles/ day of our speed.
This shot with Claire at the helm leaving Mindelo is the only land we saw until Barbados appeared out of heavy rain 11 days later
Michael thought that a red wooden plug would be best, so we painted one we had which quite quickly caught our first and biggest fish.
Double click for full size photos).
The
seas were not particularly large, about 4 metres max, but were steeper than
we expected for deep water.We had a healthy wake, as seen at the left, and lots of foam from the bow wave passing the ports.
The made us sail the last thousand miles under the trisail.
With such good winds, we did not lose much speed.
We felt very lucky to have such good winds, relative to friends who left 2 weeks ahead of us and took 22 days, despite burning all their diesel.
Lots of flying fish, including a large one that hit two of us when we wer working on the foredeck at night.
Dolphins too, including one pod of about 20