The albatrosses are getting bigger – is that good or bad?

We’ve now been at sea for 8 days, many of which are just a blur. In the
last few we’ve been reaching in fairly stable winds and it gets a bit
monotonous. I’m in no way complaining as it looks like we’re going to get
our backs kicked in a few days by a cold front with strong and gusty winds
so we may as well enjoy the easy ride for now.

I’ve taken the chance to eat more than in the previous days and add as
much as possible to the rest and energy bank as i’m sure we still have to
see a lot worse than so far.

Our distance to Phesheya has been fairly constant but we’ve lost VHF and
AIS contact which is a shame as a friendly voice in the middle of the
ocean really makes your day. We also made some gains on the leaders, but
the separation is such that they will stay in the following winds longer
than us so not many hopes of catching them…

Today an enormous albatross came to circle the boat, it was twice the size
of any we’d seen so far, quite amazing.

Last but not least, a big thanks to the donations received since leaving
Cape Town to our racing funds at www.marconannini.com/help
During leg 1 the funds raised where sufficient to repair most of the
damage sustained, such as the torn A6, the broken pulpit and the wind
instruments we had lost, thank you all!!!

Posted by: firstclass