The weather system which affected us Thursday evening and through Friday did leave a very short lived legacy of better speeds but unfortunately the high pressure ridge, which had been pushed south, fairly quickly filled the void left by the … Continue reading
Yes, really we have three time zones on Starblazer, or rather clocks etc. showing three different times. ‘Why?’ you may ask. The answer is easy. The clock on the wall tells us the time in UT or GMT or Zulu … Continue reading
Days seven and eight were a great improvement on the previous few days, at least in terms of weather. The seas calmed down to about 2-3 metres, the winds dropped and eventually all but disappeared for most of Wednesday. We … Continue reading
The past three days have been dominated by the weather, our day’s runs have reflected decisions we have made concerning where to head to avoid the worst of it. Saturday to Sunday we only made 119 miles towards the Azores … Continue reading
Day 3, noon Friday to noon Saturday, comprised a number of course changes. Our pathetically slow progress northeastwards to find a better breeze finally paid off from mid- afternoon onwards, when we could lay a course a bit closer to … Continue reading
The start at 1100 on Wednesday was interesting. Somehow we managed to sail over the line at 3.2 knots in very little wind. We put in a tack and found we could only make 1.9 so we put the engine … Continue reading
Whether we like it or not! This was a speech therapy rhyme remembered from my first few months in infant school, but it adequately describes the last few days! The highlight of Wednesday was possibly the beef carbonnade, however the … Continue reading
Yesterday the sun reappeared, for most of the day anyway. The wind, on the other hand, reduced even further, barely reaching the heady heights of 8 knots! All this means one thing; we have been plodding along on the engine … Continue reading
If you understand this statement; no we don’t have to go and clear up after the horses! After two days of rewarding, fast sailing we sort of hit the buffers, to mix my metaphors. Between midday and 1800 yesterday we … Continue reading
The 24 hours from noon Sunday to noon Monday presented us with a few challenges. From a sailing point of view, the wind held through to about 0600 when it began to drop a little. From 0900 to noon it … Continue reading