[password] brucelaura
[position]6 16S 23 32W
[status] Friday, February 14, 10:00 am UTC
Day 8. Happy Valentine's Day!
As we close in on the equator, we are seeing, on our weather maps, storm cells (RAIN) developing in our path. Yesterday we did our daily jibe in order to skirt one of these cells. As the boom went over, there was a loud BOOM, and much chaos. Our clew had blown out of the mainsail (our clew is a stainless ring at the corner of the sail that secures it to the aft end of the boom). It was attached with 5 strips of webbing and we think the sun weakened the attachment points. We immediately put a reef in the sail as the 3 reef points have its own clew(s). Overnight the wind picked up to 20-25 so the reefed main was more than adequate. Our options are to go with a reefed main for rest of the trip, or, if we go through a calm patch at the equator, we can make a simple repair that should hold until we get to a sail maker. We anticipate that we will need to keep a reef in the mainsail once we're in the Caribbean trade winds anyway.
Our birds, Heckle and Jeckle, returned to their roost last night. A few of their friends decided to crash the party and much squawking ensued. They are a dark charcoal gray so might be sooty terns. They sound similar to the laughing gulls that migrate through the Virgin Islands in the spring. Our birds leave before the sun comes up so we haven't had a good look at them. They are welcome to ride with us so long as they stay where their poop doesn't hit the deck.
The casualty count for the flying fish decreased today 0
but still in the double digits. These are mostly babies, about 2 inches long. We had one about a foot long that would have made a good meal, but mostly the adults have better sense.
Cheers,
The Highways

Sent from Iridium Mail & Web.

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