Leg 6 - Stanley, Falklands Islands to Horta, Azores (cont)

Date: Sunday 25 April 2004

Day: 276, Day 44 Leg 6

Local time: 1200 GMT-2

Leg Number and name: Leg 6, Falklands to Azores

Position - Latitude, Longitude: 09/20'N, 28/32'W

Position relative to land: 420 nm SW of Ile Foso in the Cape Verde Islands

Distance travelled in last 24hrs: 120 miles

Distance sailed this Leg: 4,573 nm

Total distance from Ardmore: 24,605 miles

Course: 335T

Speed: 5.2 knots

Next Port: Horta, Azores

Approx distance to next port: 1,745nm (adjusted - straight line - it'll be
further the way we go to make the most of the wind)

Wind: NNE F4 (11-16 knots)

Sea: Becoming modeerate to bumpy

Barometer: 1011 steady

Air Temp: 25C, with wind chill 22C

Sea temp: 27.9C

Cloud cover: 70%

Bird sightings over the day:

- Bulwer Petrel

- Arctic tern

- Arctic Jaeger



Notes: Nick wearing red fleece at midnight for first time since... Distant
loom of a Long-liner on starboard beam. Plough visible for days but still no Pole star yet.



Long-tailed Skua, Bulwer's Petrel, 17 Arctic Terns (maybe we've seen a
couple of hundred now). Flying fish in the scuppers.



Doghouse windows and scupper scrubbing to keep smart. Timmy cleaned the
brasses for Anzac Day. MC prepared roast potatoes with Rosemary and onions set in Spanish omelette, this was baked in the oven alongside the famous Anzac biscuits. Stirring stuff.



The Trade Wind is veering a little (clockwise now we are back in the
Northern Hemisphere, anti-clockwise in Southern Hemisphere) so we are making more to North than North-west; but we are stopped in our tracks when the bow buries in waves from the previous wind.



Lots of Chinese chat on Channel 16 and a waxing 1/4 moon, as we hobby horse
away NNW. We are 420 nm SW of Ile Fogo in the Cape Verde Islands; we sailed past this 9,000 foot volcano in 1974, it's famous for the quality of the coffee grown on its slopes. On this voyage I heard in Cape Town that there are pirates round the Cape Verde's now.



Into the mist......



John Ridgway

Date: Monday 26 April 2004

Day: 277, Day 45 Leg 6

Local time: 1200 GMT-2

Leg Number and name: Leg 6, Falklands to Azores


Position - Latitude, Longitude: 11/19'N, 29/23'W

Position relative to land: 400 nm WSW of Cape Verde Islands

Distance travelled in last 24hrs: 135 miles

Distance sailed this Leg: 4,708 nm

Total distance from Ardmore: 24,740 miles

Course: 350T

Speed: 5.4 knots

Next Port: Horta, Azores

Approx distance to next port: 1627nm (adjusted - straight line - it'll be further the way we go to make the most of the wind)

Wind: NE F4 (11-16 knots)

Sea: Moderate Trade Wind swell developing

Barometer: 1012 steady

Air Temp: 25C, with wind chill 22C

Sea temp: 27.5C

Cloud cover: 10%

Bird sightings over the day:

- Bulwer Petrel

- Arctic tern

- Storm Petrel: Leach's, Band-rumped, Wilson's




Notes: Eating up the miles north as the wind fills in and the seas build a little. Although the splashing keeps the hatches shut it is still noticeably cooler and this is a great relief on the Prickly heat.



A dozen flying fish ended up in the scuppers today. They shoot away from us in silver curtains. They are in fact pretty bony to eat.



The birds are mostly Storm Petrels, as they would need to be if they are indeed the most numerous bird on the planet.



There is a push, led by Nick, to smarten the boat up before we arrive in Horta, which we think could be around 12 days if present progress holds. It is heartening to find the old shippy in better shape coming home than going out.



Into the mist......


John Ridgway

Date: Tuesday 27 April 2

Local time: 1200 GMT-2

Leg Number and name: Leg 6, Falklands to Azores


Position - Latitude, Longitude: 13/22'N, 30/14'W

Position relative to land:

Distance travelled in last 24hrs: 130 miles

Distance sailed this Leg: 4,838 nm

Total distance from Ardmore: 24,870 miles

Course: 338T

Speed: 5.7 knots

Next Port: Horta, Azores

Approx distance to next port: 1507nm (adjusted - straight line - it'll be further the way we go to make the most of the wind)

Wind: NE F4 (11-16 knots)

Sea: Moderate Trade Wind swell

Barometer: 1014 steady

Air Temp: 24C, with wind chill 20C

Sea temp: 25.8C

Cloud cover: 60%

Bird sightings over the day:

- Red-billed Tropic bird



Notes:


I was grumpy all day. I trod on Marie Christine's foot and said I'd thought she was a beetle. At lunch, Nick, that pillar of virtue, said if his daughter behaved in such a negative way he would send her to her bedroom and tell her not to come out until she was better. Fat lot of good that would do, holier than thou!



So I went. Irritated by a whole lot of things, most of them not on this boat at all; and the interminable Prickly Heat.



By supper time I was hungry, so I developed a more positive approach, put the scales back on my eyes and came out to meet my fellow beings.



It was a nice supper of pasta tubes with olives and anchovies. Just what I hate. There, I've said it, after 40 years. But all the same it is a sizeable step up on the alternative - fat nothing.



Marie Christine is in a frenzy of tapestry knitting and because the butter and eggs won't last, cake making. Presently it is vast chocolate cakes, which only Nick and Tim can eat because the rest of us are on the ghastly slimming. Igor does two hours PT a day, trussed up like a turkey, toning himself for his return to the Peruvian beaches.



Perhaps few could be tip-top for 278 days on the trot, particularly being woken at quarter to midnight. And for me, the Internet is not the place I would choose to express my inner-most feelings. In fact, I have grown to hate it. Natural though it might seem for others to think that others might like express their inner-most feelings on it.



For one thing, there is no way of knowing what tomorrow will bring. There's no hindsight on this lark.



For another, I do miss the albatross on this endless starboard tack up the North Atlantic and in my bones I pretty much know I'll not see the old bird in the same grand manner again.



My memory is of the old shippy striding across the Southern Ocean in the fresh light of early day, surrounded all the while by albatrosses of every kind, like old friends calling by to cheer us along. And Brent Stephenson, a complete stranger from the other end of the world, jumping up and down by the wheel crying "This is the best day of my life - and it's only just begun!"



So far from the petty cares of everyday modern living. So great that a stranger should share my delight in something so simple, so natural, yet so vital.



Into the mist......



John Ridgway

Date: Wednesday 28 April 2004

Day: 279, Day 47 Leg 6

Local time: 1200 GMT-2

Leg Number and name: Leg 6, Falklands to Azores


Position - Latitude, Longitude: 15/23'N, 31/10'W

Position relative to land: 400 miles west of Cape Verde Islands

Distance travelled in last 24hrs: 135 miles

Distance sailed this Leg: 4,973 nm

Total distance from Ardmore: 25,005 miles

Course: 336T

Speed: 6.0 knots

Next Port: Horta, Azores

Approx distance to next port: 1390nm (adjusted - straight line - it'll be further the way we go to make the most of the wind)

Wind: NNE F5 (17-21 knots)

Sea: Moderate Trade Wind swell

Barometer: 1017 steady

Air Temp: 22C, with wind chill 17C

Sea temp: 23.4C

Cloud cover: 10%

Bird sightings over the day:

- Storm Petrel: Leach's, Band-rumped,

- Long tailed Jaeger

- Arctic Tern

- Red-billed Tropic bird



Notes: A little more composed. The sea water temperature is down to 25C from 31C a week or so back. The air temperature is much down and I'm thinking of "April in Portugal" - it can't be that hot in Horta surely.



The flying fish still pile up in the port scuppers and one hit the front of the Doghouse last night like the Hammer of Thor.


Black patch. "How did you lose your eye?"



"I was hit by a Flying-fish"



"Oh"



We have seen four more Red-billed Tropic Birds over the past couple of days. Wonderful. Always one snow-white bird alone in a sky of blue. Life was meant to be like this.



There's very little to complain about really, though given time I'm sure I could think of something. It is only a game really you know - and I'm pretty sure it won't be Pasta for supper tonight.



Into the mist......



John Ridgway

Date: Thursday 29 April 2004

Day: 280, Day 48 Leg 6

Local time: 1200 GMT-2

Leg Number and name: Leg 6, Falklands to Azores


Position - Latitude, Longitude: 17/24'N, 31/44'W

Position relative to land: 1,273 miles south of Horta, Azores

Distance travelled in last 24hrs: 125 miles

Distance sailed this Leg: 5,098nm

Total distance from Ardmore: 25,130 miles

Course: 016T

Speed: 3.8 knots

Next Port: Horta, Azores

Approx distance to next port: 1273nm (adjusted - straight line - it'll be further the way we go to make the most of the wind)

Wind: ENE F3 (7-10 knots)

Sea: Light, becoming calm

Barometer: 1015 steady

Air Temp: n/a

Sea temp: 25.0C

Cloud cover: 10%

Bird sightings over the day:

- Storm Petrel: Leach's, Band-rumped,

- Long tailed Jaeger

- Arctic Tern

- Red-billed Tropic bird



Notes: The sea was calmer by midnight. The wind already beginning to fall away with the Southern Cross magnificent on the southern horizon and Nick reporting the Pole Star off the end of the Plough for the first time. But for us it was buried in northern clouds.



The light airs continued to fall during the morning as is Nick's Sandtex bucket of muesli. What will he do when the last flakes disappear? Fortunately Marie Christine has one simple bench-mark in life: Everything is measured above or below Prisoner-of-war level. Presently we are well above the mark and "Well, he'll just have to cope!" is the stern edict. But does Nick view life on the same gauge? My guess is he'll submerge himself in the last jar of Peanut Butter, which has just been lodged within the sliding doors of the Crew's Snacks cupboard. I didn't say anything but I did see a variable thickness of it already on Nick's elevenses. He sits bolt upright and with his long back, tries to keep the plate above eye-level to normals. I suppose he's thinking its in the clouds or something.



We were becalmed by noon and that final jar will surely dwindle with 1,273 miles to go. I find it such a struggle to pass that cupboard. "You're a gonner!" sneers Marie Christine if I slip.



It's hand steering now and we're just trickling along. Still there are 1.5 sacks of the legendary Chilean White Onions remaining.



We passed very close to a dozing Sperm whale; these little chaps can weigh up to 60 tonnes, dive for an hour to 3,000 metres to guzzle giant squid in the darkness of the abyss. Could it have been asleep there - blowing every 15 seconds or so? It took absolutely no notice of our passing, no curiosity, no fear. If we'd been ancient mariners it might have been easy to row up quietly from behind it and throw a harpoon.



But what if we had run into it in the night? What damage might it have done with its tail as it panicked to dive?



A group of some 20 Striped Dolphins were sighted, they were feeding. Tim thought they could have been hunting in conjunction with large fish like Tuna.



Into the mist......



John Ridgway

Date: Friday 30 April 2004

Day: 281, Day 49 Leg 6

Local time: 1200 GMT-2

Leg Number and name: Leg 6, Falklands to Azores


Position - Latitude, Longitude: 18/17'N, 31/40'W

Position relative to land: 360 miles WNW of Cape Verde Islands

Distance travelled in last 24hrs: 70 miles

Distance sailed this Leg: 5,168 nm

Total distance from Ardmore: 25,200 miles

Course: 040T

Speed: 3.2 knots

Next Port: Horta, Azores

Approx distance to next port: 1221nm (adjusted - straight line - it'll be
further the way we go to make the most of the wind)

Wind: SE F3 (7-10 knots)

Sea: Moderate Calm

Barometer: 1016 steady

Air Temp: 28C, with wind chill 28C

Sea temp: 25.8C

Cloud cover: 5%

Bird sightings over the day:

- Petrel: Bulwers

- Storm Petrel: Band-rumped,

- Arctic Tern



Notes: This was a day of calm, another one! Hand-steering for hour after
hour, to coax two or three miles north in 60 minutes. We sailed 70 miles
to get 52 nearer to Horta, noon-noon.



We travel across this empty, empty ocean, thinking there's just nothing
here at all. But at night looking down, we see miniature monsters fighting
microscopic battles filled with luminous explosions, overseen by the
galaxies above.



Yesterday, we saw the Sperm Whale and 20 Striped Dolphins. Today, we had 50
Atlantic Spotted Dolphins playing round the bow for an hour or more, with
another 50 all around. Perhaps the excitement triggered their bowels, Over
the bows peering into the crystal-blue water, one second a dolphin next
second a broad grey ribbon of excreta; yesterday's fish, two or three
years of life extinguished in one gulp. I must drive more carefully.



A handful of Arctic Terns flapped by, they'll need to hurry or miss the
best nesting sites.



Nick put us on the Port Tack after lunch when he began his lonely four
hours in the sun. We each give him a 15 minute spell to cut the time.



And so we plodded vaguely North all afternoon and evening. Six hours for
ten miles.



Luckily we have each found a way of coming to terms with time and space,
seven weeks now since the Governor's elegant dinner of toothfish and silver
in Stanley.



Nick is learning Banjo Patterson's "Clancy of the Overflow" and I'm
grappling with Norman MacCaig's "Ardmore" and at last, dreaming new
schemes. Perhaps I'll not go "unburnished" after all. I seem to learn
quicker now, than ever I could. What does that mean? And I'm returning
to the Yoga.



Into the mist......



John Ridgway

Date: Saturday 1 May 2004

Day: 282, Day 50 Leg 6

Local time: 1200 GMT-2

Leg Number and name: Leg 6, Falklands to Azores


Position - Latitude, Longitude: 18/55'N, 31/26'W

Position relative to land: 360 miles WNW of Cape Verde Islands

Distance travelled in last 24hrs: 40 miles

Distance sailed this Leg: 5,208 nm

Total distance from Ardmore: 25,240 miles

Course: 021T

Speed: 2.00 knots

Next Port: Horta, Azores

Approx distance to next port: 1182nm (adjusted - straight line - it'll be further the way we go to make the most of the wind)

Wind: E F1-2

Sea: Moderate Calm, big long swell

Barometer: 1015 steady

Air Temp: 23C, with wind chill 22C

Sea temp: 25.8C

Cloud cover: 30%

Bird sightings over the day:

- Greater Shearwater

- Petrel: Bulwers

- Storm Petrel: Band-rumped,

- Arctic Tern

- Long-tailed Tropic Bird



Notes: May Day 2004. It seems only yesterday it was May Day 2003. Already we are nearing home,at the end of our great adventure. I suppose time has passed so quickly because it has been so absorbing, on two levels:



Firstly, the struggle, the continuous cliff-hanger, to sail the old shippy and the very various people right round the world through the Southern Ocean. Secondly, there has been the surprisingly demanding but most rewarding Albatross programme organised for us by Birdlife International in each port, where we would ordinarily rest and repair.



My life would have seemed very short if each year had been as vivid and as quick as this one.



It may appear rather odd to be writing the above paragraph when we have sailed only 40 miles in the past 24 hours. But again there was the smallish whale which blew only 5 metres off the port bow when Nick was alone on watch in a still, clear dawn around 0530. And the group of dolphins which called by as they were heading N.E., a little earlier.



Nick also saw a white bird take off from the sea, it might have been a Long-tailed Tropic Bird, none of us had ever seen one other than alone and in the air. Tim said if it was resting on the surface it would have kept its long white streamers out of the water at about 45deg. In fact one did appear eight hours later, and it circled the boat several times with its yellow bill before heading off towards the East.



We were moving so slowly we became a "raft" once more and fish gathered in the shade beneath us. A father and son pair of small brown fish managed to elude a long thin Dorado, while gathering clumps of rust-coloured almost-seawead slipped along the hull, or is it fish spawn, more likely. Are we far from the Sargasso Sea?



Into the mist......



John Ridgway

Date: Sunday 2 May 2004

Day: 283, Day 51 Leg 6

Local time: 1200 GMT-2

Leg Number and name: Leg 6, Falklands to Azores


Position - Latitude, Longitude: 20/01'N, 32/24'W

Position relative to land: 900 miles off the west coast of Africa

Distance travelled in last 24hrs: 75 miles

Distance sailed this Leg: 5,283 nm

Total distance from Ardmore: 25,315 miles

Course: 326T

Speed: 2.7 knots

Next Port: Horta, Azores

Approx distance to next port: 1,124nm (adjusted - straight line - it'll be further the way we go to make the most of the wind)

Wind: NNE F2 (4-6 knots)

Sea: Light chop with underlying swell from NE

Barometer: 1016 steady

Air Temp: 23C, with wind chill 22C

Sea temp: 25.4C

Cloud cover: 40%

Bird sightings over the day:

- White tailed Tropic Bird

- Pomarine Skua

- Arctic Tern



Notes: Midnight. Hazy 3/4 moon like a street light on a misty night. A chill in the air, time for a fleece. Smooth sea, ominous long long swell from far distant (I hope) North Atlantic storm.



Very colourful dawn. Gene Feldman at NASA has warned us to look out for red Saharan sand. The world is blowing away.



Pomarine Skua and Red-billed Tropic Bird. Wind looks more purposeful today at last. But the heat of the day sucks the heart out of it again. Then it picked itself up again in late afternoon, in a blood red sandy sunset.



For the second time, over an interval of ten years or so, I'm reading 'High Endeavours' a biography of Miles and Beryl Smeeton. Heroes of mine since the 1960's. But they are long dead now and I'm only a couple of years younger then the 'old age' photo of Miles in the book. I'm appalled to find they're casting their spell on me again, from beyond the grave, now. Miles has just said "the world would be intolerable if adventure was not just round the corner".



Well, I've got through this trip, which I thought would be such a strain, over a few short years, it might kill me. But funnily enough, I don't feel so bad. Maybe I'll make another come-back. I can see a way ahead, thanks to Miles and Beryl. And maybe Lance Armstrong too.



Perhaps MC and I will tune-up and set out on a rip-roaring final quarter.



Into the mist......



John Ridgway

Date: Monday 3 May 2004

Day: 284, Day 52 Leg 6

Local time: 1200 GMT-2

Leg Number and name: Leg 6, Falklands to Azores

Position - Latitude, Longitude: 21/20'N, 32/58'W

Position relative to land: 850 miles west of 'Country of Moorish Tribes'

Distance travelled in last 24hrs: 90 miles

Distance sailed this Leg: 5,373 nm

Total distance from Ardmore: 25,405 miles

Course: 005T

Speed: 4.8 knots

Next Port: Horta, Azores

Approx distance to next port: 1,052nm (adjusted - straight line - it'll be further the way we go to make the most of the wind)

Wind: NE F4 ( knots)

Sea: Light, but growing with building wind

Barometer: 1018 steady

Air Temp: 23C, with wind chill 19C

Sea temp: 24.6C

Cloud cover: 80%

Bird sightings over the day:

- Arctic Tern



Notes: Wind up and down through 5-16 knots all night. One minute "This is it! We're on our way!" Then "Gone flat again!" All in all it was a Z-like course, with the moon playing hide-and-seek with the clouds While the helmsman tweaked the Monitor or steered by hand.



A grey dawn brought a true wind, but then again, it didn't. After breakfast with MC's hand on the wheel, things began to settle with the wind veering to the east and steadily building.



By noon we were 21 North, 33 West, and that put us, on my trusty 1883 Admiralty chart of the North Atlantic Ocean, about 850 miles off the 'Country of the Moorish Tribes' with just over a thousand miles to the Azores.



The ENE wind filled in all afternoon and sail was reduced to suit as the going grew bumpy.



Poor MC spent an hour and a half juggling a pressure cooker of red kidney beans, one saucepan of rice and another of onion, garlic, salt, tomato, cumin, oregano, chili powder and corned beef, to come up with a hot meal of chili con-carne which in the end she couldn't face. So Igor dished it out.



We are on our way.



Into the mist......



John Ridgway

Date: Tuesday 4 May 2004

Day: 285, Day 53 Leg 6

Local time: 1200 GMT-2

Leg Number and name: Leg 6, Falklands to Azores


Position - Latitude, Longitude: 23/31'N, 33/22'W

Position relative to land: Less than a thousand miles south of the Azores

Distance traveled in last 24hrs: 140 miles

Distance sailed this Leg: 5,513 nm

Total distance from Ardmore: 25,545 miles

Course: 350T

Speed: 6.0 knots

Next Port: Horta, Azores

Approx distance to next port: 929nm (adjusted - straight line - it'll be further the way we go to make the most of the wind)

Wind: NE F5 (17-21 knots)

Sea: Moderate with many white caps. On starboard bow.

Barometer: 1020 steady

Air Temp: 22C, with wind chill 19C

Sea temp: 24.2C

Cloud cover: 25%

Bird sightings over the day:

- Storm Petrel: Band-rumped

- Long tailed Jaeer

- Arctic Tern

- Cory's Shearwater



Notes: Coming on Watch at midnight: "We've just had a black cloud, the wind was up to 30 knots" warned Nick, grimly as only Nick can be, "But it's down now - just watch out for them!" Tired after a long day, his long frame disappeared down the hatchway like a jack-in-the-box.



It was under a thousand miles to Horta and by 0045 we were out of the Tropics, that's more than 22.5 degrees north.



We did have a black cloud but it was a small one and we held onto the sails through the 30 knot gusts and slipped along, through the lull that followed. The sleepy heads came on at 0200, Igor and Tim are never at their best on the "graveyard watch" 0200-0400, whereas at 0200, MC and I are at our most joyous: thinking of our bunks and no call until 0545 when its already light. But how we hate Nick's call at quarter to midnight every blinking night.



Two separate Long-tailed Skuas and an Arctic Tern heading north. And two Red-billed Tropic Birds, hours apart, heading east. But how I'd love to see a big Wandering Albatross wheeling in the wind.



Nick and I reckon we are still in the NE Trades, it's just that they are a bit desultory right now. THe air temperature is grand, at 19C with the wind chill added, life is very pleasant. Great works are going ahead all over the boat to sharpen up.



One day short of the full moon on a clear night and we had a grandstand view of a partial eclipse which took the curved top quarter off, leaving it looking like a soft-boiled egg with the top cut off, from 1915 to 2015.



Into the mist......



John Ridgway

Date: Wednesday 5 May 2004

Day: 286, Day 54 Leg 6

Local time: 1200 GMT-2

Leg Number and name: Leg 6, Falklands to Azores


Position - Latitude, Longitude: 25/12'N, 33/49'W

Position relative to land:

Distance travelled in last 24hrs: 110 miles

Distance sailed this Leg: 5,623 nm

Total distance from Ardmore: 25,655 miles

Course: 026T

Speed: 5.4 knots

Next Port: Horta, Azores

Approx distance to next port: 840nm (adjusted - straight line - it'll be
further the way we go to make the most of the wind)

Wind: E F4 (11-16 knots)

Sea: Moderate to light

Barometer: 1021 steady

Air Temp: 21C, with wind chill 18C

Sea temp: 23.4C

Cloud cover: 60%

Bird sightings over the day:

- Storm Petrel: Band-rumped

- Long tailed Jaeger




Notes: After the partial eclipse, midnight gave us a glorious night bathed
with light and a smooth sea, perfect for just about anything but sailing.
Towering but distant and slow-moving, the black rain-clouds dominated local
weather for the day; their trailing curtains of slanting rain seemingly
motionless. The breeze was 5-22 knots from a sunny sky, but mostly at the
bottom end of the scale.



It was late in the afternoon when Nick told us we had just crossed the 1973
outward track of The Aegre, on her way to the West Indies. Nick had bought
the 21' lug-rigged open wooden boat at Ardmore for £300 and we had
pursuaded Bobby Macinness to partially plank her over in his Nissen hut, in
nearby Scourie, during the previous winter.



The effects of that long-ago voyage with its catastrophic capsize in
mid-Pacific and hair's breadth survival to reach Samoa, have played such a
large part in the success of our present voyage thus far.



As I announced to a startled Marie Rogers one south-bound tropical evening
last September, "We are lucky to have one of the great passage makers of
the world with us - Nick Grainger."



Perhaps there is something about travelling across an ocean in a really
tiny open wooden boat, like The Aegre, or my own North Atlantic dory rowing
boat, which brings a closeness to the sea, nature and life which can never
be erased. Indeed with the passage of the years its effects may even
magnify. How fortunate we both were to have had that experience, to come to
understand that it's the journey, not the direction which matters. I'm sure
it's that fundamental understanding which has brought us safely this far.



Perhaps all this becomes increasingly incomprehensible in the rush of faxes
and emails and mobile phones which pressurise our modern life.



And, how fortunate we are to have had these 284 days, with the Albatross
wheeling across our wake to jog our memories and to help us consider if we
wish to return to madness or to alter course.



Into the mist......



John Ridgway

Date:Thursday 6 May 2004

Day: 287, Day 55 Leg 6

Local time: 1200 GMT-2

Leg Number and name: Leg 6, Falklands to Azores


Position - Latitude, Longitude: 26/45'N, 34/23'W

Position relative to land: 900 miles WSW of Tenerife, Canary Islands

Distance travelled in last 24hrs: 100 miles

Distance sailed this Leg: 5,723 nm

Total distance from Ardmore: 25,755 miles

Course: 351T

Speed: 4.9 knots

Next Port: Horta, Azores

Approx distance to next port: 761nm (adjusted - straight line - it'll be further the way we go to make the most of the wind)

Wind: NE F3 (6-10 knots)

Sea: Moderate to light

Barometer: 1021 steady

Air Temp: 21C, with wind chill 19C

Sea temp: 24.6C

Cloud cover: 50%

Bird sightings over the day:

- Cory's Shearwater

- Long tailed Jaeger




Notes: Message as before. 24hrs of plugging along with NNW the resolution of all the different directions we've sailed, from West to NNE.



Peering over the bow we see plenty of Gooseneck barnacles projecting at right-angles from the hull. They'll be slowing us down a good bit. There were none there in the Falklands when the diver checked the rudder and the prop; he was most reassuring about how clean the bottom was.



But this is another long leg, eight weeks tomorrow 6,500+ miles and most of it in this milk-warm soupy water. Long legs on this voyage - like the Albatross, we don't stop often.



Into the mist......



John Ridgway

Date:Friday 7 May 2004

Day: 288, Day 56 Leg 6

Local time: 1200 GMT-2

Leg Number and name: Leg 6, Falklands to Azores


Position - Latitude, Longitude: 28/45'N, 34/34'W

Position relative to land: 900 miles west of Tenerife, Canary Islands

Distance travelled in last 24hrs: 115 miles (213 kilometres)

Distance sailed this Leg: 5,838 nm (10,812 kilometres)

Total distance from Ardmore: 25,870 miles (47,911 kilometres)

Course: 341T

Speed: 6.0 knots

Next Port: Horta, Azores

Approx distance to next port: 761nm (adjusted - straight line - it'll be further the way we go to make the most of the wind)

Wind: NE F3 (6-10 knots)

Sea: Light but a bit lumpy

Barometer: 1026 rising steady

Air Temp: 21C, with wind chill 17C

Sea temp: 23.8C

Cloud cover: 15%

Bird sightings over the day:

- Red-billed Tropic Bird



Notes: Holding our breath on a silken sea as another perfect dawn heralded a fresher day of endless sun under a dream rig. Paradiso! Long gone - dull care. 900 miles west of the Canaries.



The first time I've ever seen two Tropic Birds together; Red-billed, with elegant white streamers longer than themselves. They called to one another as they circled above the mast before heading west.



We are all enjoying this bonus after a long, long haul round the world. 47,000 km so far.



At 2215 a ship out of the Panama Canal, bound for Spain, crossed our bow at 1.5 miles. We must watch out now, as we begin the unfamiliar business of crossing shipping lanes between the the old and new worlds of Europe and America.



Into the mist......



John Ridgway

Date: Friday 8 May 2004

Day: 289, Day 57 Leg 6

Local time: 1200 GMT-2

Leg Number and name: Leg 6, Falklands to Azores


Position - Latitude, Longitude: 30/49'N, 34/35'W

Position relative to land: 2,045 nm (3,787 kilometres) SSW of Ardmore

Distance travelled in last 24hrs: 140 miles (259 kilometres)

Distance sailed this Leg: 5,978 nm (11,071 kilometres)

Total distance from Ardmore: 26,010 miles (48,170 kilometres)

Course: 022T

Speed: 5.1 knots

Next Port: Horta, Azores

Approx distance to next port: 546nm (1,011 kilometres) (adjusted - straight
line - it'll be further the way we go to make the most of the wind)

Wind: ENE F4 (11-16 knots)

Sea: Moderate

Barometer: 1027 rising steady

Air Temp: 21C, with wind chill 18C

Sea temp: 20.9C

Cloud cover: 5%

Bird sightings over the day:

- Shearwater sp.

- Arctic Tern



Notes: Nick said the moon came over the horizon like an aircraft carrier.
But it is already down to 3/4 size and it's coming up into the sky later
and later. What splendid light it has bathed us in this past many days.



We had a grand day our here with the wind veering and after eight weeks
more or less continually on the wind, it is allowing us to head right at
Horta, now only a few hundred miles ahead. We have the smell of the
fleshpots in our nostrils, with 48,170 kilometres under the keel since
leaving home last July.



All the more reason for FOCUS 'More soldiers are killed returning from
patrol to enemy lines than are ever killed going out!' Ships and jets are
becoming commonplace. Nick is writing safety instructions for all crew
members between here and Ardmore.



Into the mist......



John Ridgway

Now go on to the last few days of this Leg and our arrival in Horta. 9-12 May 2003

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