Day 7: Gusts, Bananas and Special Pancake Mix

Crossing the Atlantic brings many different challenges and experiences. The FCS crew on Challenger 4 are close to the mid-point of the ARC Rally and enjoying every minute.

The Wind In Your Sails

Spent the night on lookout for whales but were entertained instead by winds gusting 17-23. We are sailing downwind so with a boat speed of 7 knots and a sudden gust of 23 knots we have a sudden surge of power to cope with, pulling the helm up to windward.

In sudden lulls, it takes the utmost skill to prevent sails flogging. 30 minutes on the helm seems like an eternity.

Already land is a distant memory, and it is a sobering thought that we are at least 600NM from the nearest pub. We have to take great care of ship and fellow crew.

We passed the 1000 miles run mark sometime in the night and celebrated with Ricky’s perfect pancake mix for breakfast. Fresh salad, pesto and pasta, followed by fruit salad for lunch. Today’s word is banana. We have about 50 ripening all at once.

Having never typed in the dark while on a roller coaster before, I plan to keep this short. Sunrise is now delayed by nearly an hour.

The fun starts when we adopt Challenger 4 local time for our watches. Even at night it is shorts and tee-shirt weather. A little more sleep would be nice, but the sailing, company and food is First Class.

Pete and Mikka

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Posted by: First Class Sailing