Rocking and Rolling towards Tonga!
Ahoy there friends and family. Things are
hotting up here. We still needed thermals and hats on our night watch
last night, but I think that could well be their last outing. Today it is
hot, hot, hot up on deck, and the sea is warming up too. We know that,
because we use saltwater for most of our washing up when we're at sea. I
splashed Eloise with some washing up water just now, and she thought it was
from the hot tap! We haven't seen anything except big rolling waves for
days now. No boats, no whales, no dolphins, no fish. It's just
Victoria, ploughing along on her own biscuit of ocean. It might sound
scary at all being out of sight of land, but actually it's not at all. It
feels completely normal now, and it's quite reassuring, especially at night -
there's nothing to crash into! We still have a good look around every 20
minutes or so, peering into the blackness for any sign of a light, and we also
have an AIS monitor which most boats would show up on. There's always the
chance of running into something large and submerged - such as a whale or a
container - but we just have to hope that doesn't happen.. The nights are
still very long and very dark and I didn't even see the moon at all last night.
This weather window was definitely not a moon window.
We are now going almost dead downwind, with our jib poled out jib on the starboard (right) side, and our mainsail fully out, held with a "preventer" rope on the port (left) side. This is a very stable set up, and we are being pushed along by 2-3m waves coming from behind, so the motion is comfortable, if a little rolly. Cooking and washing up is still a bit of a challenge, but Jack is walking around the boat rather than crawling today, which means things must have improved. It took me and Angus about two hours to sort out the sails this morning to get us going in the right direction at the fastest possible speed. We could really do with the rest of the crew giving us a hand on deck - it's awfully busy up there. Reef out, squall arrived, reef back in, port pole out, jib poled out, then the wind changed direction so we needed to gybe.. Jib away, gybe the boat, reef out, starboard pole out, genoa poled out, wind increased, genoa in, jib poled out. Thankfully, deck activities have settled since that little mid-moring burst. Angus and I are both agreed that every muscle in our whole bodies aches; we really should have made more effort to get fit before we left dry land, but better late than never. I'll have to keep up my night watch stretching regime to keep me going to the finish line.
Eloise, George and Jack keep on talking about what it would be like to be "on a cruise". We told them that what we are doing is called cruising, but they have ideas of a cruise ship, which they recreated in the aft saloon last night. They persuaded me to serve them dinner there, which was quite an effort with all the rolling, and then Eloise put on her best dress and led a yoga, relaxing and voice warm up for the boys, before they all went into full-on disco mode. They had three headtorches, all set to strobe, strung up around the room, and were dancing to Bryan Adams and swinging around the monkey pole. It seemed to wear them out well enough, and they all slept together in the aft saloon, chatting about cruises before they fell asleep.
The night was not a good one for adult sleeping, as it was very downwind and rolly, but we've only got tonight to get through, and hopefully we should arrive in Tongatapu tomorrow. If we can keep up reasonable speed, we'll get there in daylight, but as the wind is forecast to drop over the next 12-24 hours, it's more likely we will be poking our nose through the reefs and selecting a spot to drop our anchor in the dark, moonless night. Oh well, we have some very good torches on board, and electronic charts, so I'm sure we'll be fine.
Thanks to all for your messages, hope all well back in the UK. We feel a very long way from Brexit and the Tory party leadership campaigns.
Love and fair winds to all,
Laura, Angus, Eloise, George and Jack. X
We are now going almost dead downwind, with our jib poled out jib on the starboard (right) side, and our mainsail fully out, held with a "preventer" rope on the port (left) side. This is a very stable set up, and we are being pushed along by 2-3m waves coming from behind, so the motion is comfortable, if a little rolly. Cooking and washing up is still a bit of a challenge, but Jack is walking around the boat rather than crawling today, which means things must have improved. It took me and Angus about two hours to sort out the sails this morning to get us going in the right direction at the fastest possible speed. We could really do with the rest of the crew giving us a hand on deck - it's awfully busy up there. Reef out, squall arrived, reef back in, port pole out, jib poled out, then the wind changed direction so we needed to gybe.. Jib away, gybe the boat, reef out, starboard pole out, genoa poled out, wind increased, genoa in, jib poled out. Thankfully, deck activities have settled since that little mid-moring burst. Angus and I are both agreed that every muscle in our whole bodies aches; we really should have made more effort to get fit before we left dry land, but better late than never. I'll have to keep up my night watch stretching regime to keep me going to the finish line.
Eloise, George and Jack keep on talking about what it would be like to be "on a cruise". We told them that what we are doing is called cruising, but they have ideas of a cruise ship, which they recreated in the aft saloon last night. They persuaded me to serve them dinner there, which was quite an effort with all the rolling, and then Eloise put on her best dress and led a yoga, relaxing and voice warm up for the boys, before they all went into full-on disco mode. They had three headtorches, all set to strobe, strung up around the room, and were dancing to Bryan Adams and swinging around the monkey pole. It seemed to wear them out well enough, and they all slept together in the aft saloon, chatting about cruises before they fell asleep.
The night was not a good one for adult sleeping, as it was very downwind and rolly, but we've only got tonight to get through, and hopefully we should arrive in Tongatapu tomorrow. If we can keep up reasonable speed, we'll get there in daylight, but as the wind is forecast to drop over the next 12-24 hours, it's more likely we will be poking our nose through the reefs and selecting a spot to drop our anchor in the dark, moonless night. Oh well, we have some very good torches on board, and electronic charts, so I'm sure we'll be fine.
Thanks to all for your messages, hope all well back in the UK. We feel a very long way from Brexit and the Tory party leadership campaigns.
Love and fair winds to all,
Laura, Angus, Eloise, George and Jack. X
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