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2:26 PM Mon 8th March 2010

Any one want to buy some diesel?

WTF? Day one, good northerly, day 2 good northerly. Ran 380 Nautical Miles in 48 hours which is bloody excellent. Now the guide says expect a "light and variable winds and contrary current" the reason we ran 190 miles a day on white sail and windvane is we had 2 knots of current with us.

Where about 36 hours from the Galapagos, or the middle of tomorrow night. 200Nm to go.

What the hell happened to the doldrums? See I've been round here before. last time it was post after depressing post of 10 days and about to run out of fuel. We did. Such titles as:

• Doldrums
• More Doldrums
• Yet More Doldrums
• Still in the Doldrums 
• We're not going to make it....
• Nail-biting Stuff
• heartbreak

In the end we made it after running out of fuel. This time we've motored for about 4 hours. We're currently doing 6 knots in a southerly (I.E. almost certainly a southern hemisphere wind) a degree or so north of the equator. I mean read this account of this passage on Ornen. In summery it too 23 day to make the 900 odd miles. Or longer than any of my Atlantic crossing of three times that.

I am shocked and stunned. in 4 days we've moved from steady wind from  the north (end of the north east trades) into a steady southerly flow (driven by the the south east trades). With only one hour of engine in the middle. Damn!

Bali Blue

First booby on board last night, a pink footed one. Slightly more attractive than a brown booby but still never had a blue footed booby on board. I'm banging on a about attractive brown boobies, what will Google search engine think.

We've Bali Blue to leeward, Fia Tira now somewhere off our s'tbd quarter, Aspen ahead and Angel behind. We're mostly going to arrive close together, even though the fleet left over a spread of three days. Given most of the boats around us left a day before us, at least. We're cool with it.

Position: 0° 42.5' N, 87° 88' W

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