Wednesday May 15th, South Pacific Ocean 20:34S  176:15E 

Today’s Blog by Daryl (Time zone GMT+12.00; UTC +12.00)

Some of you will recall references to missing the weather front by masterly inactivity in the Opua roads. You will also have noted references to picking up the tail( technically the safe side of this depression) of the the second front by going west before heading north. Some will recall David’s predilection for sailing in warmer climes…you will only need “shorts and tee shirts”

Well don’t ask me what happened in technical terms, but here goes .Second night I eat dinner on watch in pouring rain wrapped up in Peter’s (thank you Peter)oilies while my shipmates make merry below. The weather improved a bit ..the rain held off until Monday night when Richard is up there in 25 knot winds ,pouring rain, eating his supper out of his dog bowl while David and I shelter below. The second front was definitely catching us …my watch next  and up went the wind speed , in went the genoa and  the wind speed continued to increase.. David joined me as the wind gusted over 50 knots and we hurtled on into the night under a severely furled main. Only two of his comments have been recorded for posterity…”that is the highest wind speed I have seen on this boat” and …we were “well trashed”. All I can add is I was glad we were in something as stable as Serendipity. Fortunately the wind eased off from then on and by the following morning the beloved code zero was being hauled out of my cabin

A pleasant day’s sailing or two ensued as we moved from code zero to spinnaker to cope with the wind’s backing to the South

Talk about a quick change in weather!

Richard is taking his duties as entertainment manager quite seriously…despite his blandishments neither David or I would join his table dancing classes leaving him looking quite bashful

So despondent was he that we thought he was going to return to work….here he is posing as George Osborne with his briefcase

Having assured him the economic situation was not quite that dire, he resorted to his other pastime ..taking sun sightings with the sextant

followed by hours of expletives as he tries to prove we are in the same hemisphere as the the ship’s navigation equipment shows!

Winds have now died to the point where the iron topsail has been resuscitated….let’s hope for some wind tomorrow