Thursday 31 July 2008

K: Situation Normal

That forecast westerly started rolling in just about as soon as Corrie "it's been snowing" McQ found her bunk. Trickles of wind started to show on the water, so I put the mainsail back up to try and get some wind propulsion happening. As soon as I found my bunk, Alex put three reefs into said mainsail, and the next watch it was dropped altogether! So, we're now back to running downwind with a tiny hankie of headsail poled out, and the sea is building a bit behind us. Oh - and it's very cold. Extra socks, gloves and balaclavas all round.

Yesterday's floating lumber yard has thinned out for a bit, but we nearly collided with a seal who chose the wrong time and place to surface as we were hooning down a wave. Luckily he/she took evasive action and dived again so we missed each other.

Something else interesting that I noticed in yesterday's calm and rain. The rain drops didn't "dissolve" as soon as they hit the ocean surface. The temperature/density difference between the rain and sea was enough that the drops hung around on the surface like beads of water on oil. Nifty.

Today's shade of grey: silver-grey (the sun came out for a bit and most beautiful all the lumpy shining wavy grey was).

K.

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