I got up in the middle of the night to attend to a call of nature and found someone had got there first. “Oh, excuse me”, I said, and was about to shut the door when I woke up properly and realised that not only was I the only person on board, but the interloper was a cockroach. Perched on the rim of the toilet he was making himself quite at home so I gave him a gentle nudge with the toilet brush and flushed vigorously. I know, I know, I’m supposed to be a vegan pacifist who doesn’t harm animals, but all I was doing was sending him on his way gently. Cockroaches can survive a nuclear holocaust so a quick swim home to Florida won’t hurt him.
Anyway, I’d better check all my food now to make sure it’s stored securely. Luckily the important stuff is in tins (ie. beans & beer), but I have a secret stash of chocolate chip cookies which are my treat for lonely night watches so I’ll be jolly cross if anyone’s been nibbling at them.
On to more mundane matters now. Yesterday was a very pleasant day but frustratingly the gentle breeze died away around lunchtime. After bobbing around for a couple of hours waiting for it to return I gave in and started the engine, getting us back on course at a steady six knots. I’ve got enough fuel to motor most of (if not all) the way to Bermuda but really don’t want to.
By 6pm there was still no wind but I stopped the engine for an hour for some peace and quiet and decided that since it was such a nice day with such a calm blue sea it would be nice to take a dip to cool off. I climbed down the ladder rather gingerly but the water was lovely, warm and incredibly clear, with shafts of sunlight sending bright blue beams into the hazy depths. As I swam round the boat I was a little apprehensive of whatever might be lurking in the depths beneath, or indeed shooting up towards me, but nothing grabbed me and I climbed out to dry off in the warm evening sunshine.
Underway again under power I cooked up the remains of last night’s feast and ate it in the cockpit while the sun set behind some pretty clouds on the horizon. As dusk fell I reefed the main again and switched on the radar, but as ever there was nothing to be seen except some squalls about 15 miles to the south of me.
The radar has a 48 mile range and it’s spooky to think there’s nobody within that distance, and in fact I haven’t seen a ship since dawn yesterday. However it’s also reassuring to know I’m not surrounded by supertankers waiting to run me over in the night, so I slept pretty well between 10 and 8, getting up every two hours to check the radar and take a look around, not least at the breath-taking night sky.
By 10pm there was enough of a breeze to sail again and it was a relief to turn the engine off, but at least it cooled the fridge down nicely. So much so that there was ice in my orange juice this morning which was rather nice as by shaking the bottle vigorously I had an orange slush puppy for breakfast 🙂
The wind died away around 10am today so I’m motoring again, and there’s about 620 miles to go to Bermuda. I’m heading just north of east at the moment, with a tiny ESE breeze of about 5 knots, so if it picks up I’ll be on a reach which is the fastest point of sail. However it’s not worth it until there’s at least 8-10 knots of wind, so I might have to wait a while.
Never mind, it gives me the chance to do lots of little chores, like finish stowing some of my gear, and fixing the main autopilot which is still playing up. I’m now pretty certain it’s due to my cunning wiring scheme as I had hoped that Raymarine’s SeaTalk interface was intelligent enough to tag each data packet with addressing information (like Ethernet), but I suspect from re-readng the manuals that it’s a simple serial link so I can’t just join the wires together but need to daisy-chain the instruments properly. Oh well, it’s not hard to fix and will give me something to do.
By the way, I reckon I’m pretty much slap bang in the middle of the Bermuda Triangle so am looking out for anything odd, but all I’ve seen so far is my first flying fish. And guess what – they really do fly!