We were making good progress, though, increasing our average passage SOG ( Speed Over Ground) overall, so no complaints on that front.
On their early morning watch Elaine and Justine waited for daylight with bated breath to see whether or not we were going to have a sunnier day. The wait was slightly longer this morning, since sunrise was only at 0845 according to our ship’s clock, the latter set to UTC for this passage. Thankfully sunny skies with white puffy clouds emerged. Then, with enough daylight and Roy up and about too, him and Elaine added a second reef to the mainsail and unfurled the full headsail in a wing-on-wing configuration. With this configuration and our revised COG (Course over Ground), we were heading straight to St Lucia now, with the additional advantage of a more comfortable ride.
After breakfast Elaine headed to bed, briefly waking at around noon, then went straight back to sleep. It was close to 1400 when she surfaced again; clearly she needed the sleep. Sending everyone else to bed then, she did the afternoon watch as everyone slept like babies, but not before see ensured Roy was safe in fitting a safety line to our second reefing point on the mainsail.
During Elaine and Justine’s off watch, though, Paul had assisted Roy in rebalancing Paw Paw by sheeting out the mainsail a little more and adding the preventer. In doing so, they got Paw Paw to sail directly downwind at 180 degrees; another first!
Elaine opted to do dinner tonight, since Paul had taken her night on Wednesday and last night everyone was still full from our celebratory lunch. She did, however, also opt to cook one of Justine’s designated meals; a butter chicken curry, without the chicken of course, and rice with popadoms for starters.
Then, making the most of a very pleasant evening, Justine and Paul enjoyed a game of backgammon in the cockpit, while Elaine washed the dinner dishes and Roy kept watch. It was close to 2000 when Elaine and Justine headed to bed, leaving the boys to their first watch of the night.
Towards the end of their watch, however, the wind died, leaving Elaine and Justine to try and motor-sail; an impossible task with a wing-on-wing configuration, resulting in the headsail being furled. In setting the wind angle to keep the wind in the mainsail, though, turned Paw Paw to sit side-to the horrible swell. With that, the sails were returned to the original configuration and the engine switched off, resigned to bumble along at around 4.8 Kts in the hope that the wind would pick up again, the latter activities bringing our day to a close.
