Hello Everybody...Its pretty difficult to find a moment to sit still and write a blog in these conditions!! The Cone of Silence is up/down/in use and to even dare to try and get past in wet weather clothes would be enough to get you keel hauled (understandably so, though!!!) and to take your lifejacket followed by about a gazillion wet layers off to come and writ e a blog means that invevitably something will happen on deck, kevvo will have a moment or whatever and you find yourself needing to leap back up with not nearly enough wet protection!!!
As expected the wind and the sea picked up yesterday and soon enough we were down to three reefs and a wee hankerchief of headsail!!! The good thing (in theory) about a furler is that you don't need to go to the foredeck to change the amount of sail. So the furthest forward we need to go fo r manouvres is the mast for reefing- that said the bow is only about another two steps forward of the mast on wee Berri!!!
I have seen some bigs seas in my time and I have likened the Pacific Ocean, last time I was here, to like being on a giant 3D roller coaster, for days!!! But that was on a boat nearly twice the length of Berri and if I thought that was a roller coaster- well this is something else.
On a boat this size everthing is heightened an d magnified, so the sheer scale of the walls of water that pile upon from behind seem gigantic. The wind is still blowing, gusting 30, from the starboard quarter so a great fast reach for us. The swell is from the SE but is topped with a short steep confused sea, so every so often, the swell will pick up our stern and we'll feel as if we are ploughing vertically downward and at the same time the crest of a breaking wave will break beam on, drenching us and really ensuring that we are thrown around violently as if in an open topped washing machine!!!! But it's great fun!!!!
Not just once have I turned and looked behind to see what is coming next and thanked our luckiy stars that (for the moment) we aren't going the other way- that really would be a cold, wet, miserable and grumpy ride!!!
Hope everyone is well, lots of love and Happy Birthday Carie McQ x
