[password] pilot25041
[position] 23 39.6s 178 54.3w
[status] Monday 15th October late morning & we're now safely anchored in Minerva reef along with 7 monohulls and 1 catamaran, entering through the reef around 10.20 after significantly reducing our sail plan and slowing down for the previous 16hrs so we arrived with good daylight!

Yesterday we continued with good winds all day 20-25kts true, so we were beam reaching at up to 10kts SOG, however, as the seas gradually built firstly into a short chop and later bigger 2m swells with breaking waves, the downside was a very very noisy boat, jarring and bouncing around, which made everyone apart from 'cast iron stomach' Barry either feel or actually be sick .... even the skipper succumbing!
We initially reefed the main and then at dinner time put the third reef in and only exposed a small hanky for a headsail, we now only had 85nm to go, yet we were still doing over 7kts, and would have arrived at the unmarked reef entrance around 5am, so by over-sheeting both sails, we could achieve a reduced speed of 5-5.5kts and an eta at the entrance of 10am, the bonus being the boat calmed down and everyone managed to get some decent sleep overnight ...... so all in all a far happier crew.

We are now anchored with plenty of scope out as the wind is still 20+kts in the gusts, the gribs look fairly good for a departure tomorrow, although the first 24-36hrs may be in conditions similar to the last 36hrs, after that there's a period of little wind, then headwinds, before beam reach conditions after that. So rather a mixed bag, but that's what you get with ocean passage making sailing.

Position 11.00nzt. 174nm run in 24hrs
[weather] 20knts SE, 2.5m swell from the SE, 75% cloud cover.

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