Tuesday 29 November  2022

15^o 57.8N  35^o 36.6 W

Today's Blog by David  (Time zone: UTC -2)

Good evening. 

Progress report

Still making  reasonable progress westward  -  although we have now encountered an adverse current which is cooling our progress somewhat. Right now, the nearest point of land is in Brazil.   The eastern edge of Brazil is about 1,410 miles due south; the nearest point is about 1,100 - about 400 miles closer than our destination!  

The sea is much more agitated today. There is weed on the surface which is normally the product of some bad weather somewhere – or may just be the ejecta from the Amazon River, 1,200 miles SW of us. 

Weather report

There is a lot of cloud around, really for the first time  on the passage. Squalls are not uncommon on this route. They tend to be localised – indeed  the rain can be a welcome relief. Before dusk, some more foreboding grey clouds were looming over the horizon to the SW – we hope they will be kind to us!  Happily, so far at least, using  the radar, we have not identified any rainfall under them.   Fingers crossed!

Certainly there will be fewer stars visible tonight! …… which is a good time to mention the phosphorescence displayed at night  by various plankton disturbed by our passage, leaving a sparkling green trail in our wake! It’s not particularly pronounced at  the moment, but can be very pretty.

Clocking off

Every time the clocks go back, we have to remember to alter every clock on board.  Jenna reported my error on the first clock change in which I forgot to change the clock on my iPad - leading me to arrive on deck for my 02.00 watch an hour early. At last night’s change,  I forgot to change the ship’s clock on the wall of the main saloon which, this evening, led to me - oblivious to the surrounding raised eyebrows -  reaching into the beer locker for tonight’s evening beer an  hour early!  An easy mistake to make - at least I am not on watch again until 01.00!

stuff-that-goes-wrong-and-needs-to-be-fixed

Serendipity being now 11 years old and having sailed just over 60,000 miles, from time to time things come to the end of their working life and – well -  just give in. We carry a broad stock of spare parts in the hope that most can be fixed and we haven’t troubled you with the normal litany of “stuff-that-goes-wrong-and-needs-to-be-fixed”, but one is worthy of mention.

In the last four days, two locker latches have failed.  Might not sound like The-End-Of-The-World to you but, now we are rolling to and fro (our serene and regal passage having come to an end, you will recall),  secure locker doors are quite helpful in preventing the floor being cluttered up with all sorts of things that you would rather were in the cupboards.  

The first latch was easily replaced - but …… using my last spare! When the second became evident - in short  – “Houston,  we had a problem”. While I considered an unappealing choice between several unlikely options to jury rig the doors… errr  without causing lasting damage to the woodwork …. I gave Peter the two broken latches and a screwdriver in the forlorn hope that he might be able to find a solution. To his credit, he cannibalised the two latches and managed to put together a working latch!! Hooray!!! (It’s the little things that make our day!).

Halfway?

While we have sailed about 1,350 miles through the water since we left, we are now about 1,450 miles from our departure point thanks to the benefit of  a favourable current (until just recently!)  We are currently 1,497 miles from our destination. 

Sometime before midnight tonight, we will be closer to where we are going than to where we started from !!! Hooray….!!   And Brazil will be even closer than it is now!!