Rolly Polly Day

Tuesday 29th January

Its now 5am and my (Hugh) watch again - Val having just finished her watch and gone to bed.

Yesterday was a rolly polly day, more Atlantic than Caribbean. Good winds though and in the right direction. However for comfort we reefed the jibs last night for the first time. The result is only 6 kts all night and we can no longer point to our destination. That means we will have to alter the sail set up in order to keep sailing, always preferable to motoring. We'll do that in daylight with all of us on deck. The other thing the slowing down does is put our arrival time into daylight - rather than 2am.

The VHF continues in its on/off state and I have written an email to the installer asking for help to try and sort the problems. He hasn't volunteered any information so far. One of the other boats has kindly offered to act as a relay for us with the canal authorities on our arrival, by using his VHF and our SSB long range unit.

We're all looking forward to seeing land again as we have deliberately stayed offshore, away from any potential trouble and weather. Got to go check on the gear upstairs now.