0630- Awake to blue skies and the drone of Delos engine. I stare out the hatch for a while wondering where could all the wind have possibly gone? In just a few days it will be 40 knots here but now nothing when we need it the most.
0800- Time for watch. I check our position and found we actually made some good miles last night. Motoring through the night with current in our favor made a difference. We can now reach Maputo by 0600 Thursday morning if we maintain 5.4 knots, which is definitely doable. Especially if the current stays with us. Since our fuel supply is precious I reduce the RPM’s on the Volvo to about 1,200. This is the minimum amount to maintain just over 5.4 knots. The rest of my watch is uneventful and I spend the time reading and staring at the small swells out there. 1200- I have been working doing some editing on the computer since my watch ended. But now I’m getting hungry and decide to go out and see what the hell the status with lunch is. It turns out it’s my cooking day so shame on me. I whip up a little pasta chicken salad and it got pretty good reviews. Well done Capt. Breeyawn! I go back do editing for another hour or so.
0100- Tired of the computer head up to the cockpit for fresh air and a bit of reading. Not much going on. There is a tiny puff of wind but not enough to sail. I decide to check our fuel and find out we have about 150 liters left. This is actually more than I thought so, pleased with that. It’s enough to motor for another 2.5 days if necessary, even more if we keep the RPM really low like we did today.
0300- Wind! We have wind! The sails stop flapping and start pulling Delos forward. We shut down the Volvo and actually have wind out of the North, which means downwind sailing. The best! The fish alarm goes off a few times but nothing hooks up on the lure. I pull them in to check the hooks and lures and all is well. We get an email back from Maretron technical support with some troubleshooting steps on our wind gauge. I can’t remember if I mentioned it before but it’s been acting up like crazy. For example, right now it’s blowing 10-15 but the readout says 60 knots. It’s all over the place. We really want to get it sorted before rounding the cape so I spend a few hours checking the connections as recommended. I’ll need to relay the findings back to Maretron via email on the Iridium and then wait for a response. Hope to have it sorted soon. 0600- It’s time for my afternoon watch, but also time to cook dinner. I decide to do a hybrid curry. Green Curry Base using a few cloves of garlic and some leftovers from last night’s dinner (mashed potatoes namely). There is also some left over Zebu meat so I chop that up and chuck it in the pot. I add a can of butter beans, a can of mini corns, and a can of peas. We are nearly out of fresh veggies so hitting the can supply from now on. We are running low on white rice so I opt for brown even though it takes longer to cook. The experiment is a success, the Zebu mixed with the Thai Green Curry had a really nice flavour.
1100- We are still sailing! Speed- 7.5 knots headed directly towards Maputo with 10-15 out of the North. 156 miles to go so if all holds together looks like we will make it just before the weather rolls out of the south. Fingers crossed!
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