11-Dec-2008 Noon Position

Atlantic Crossing Day #4
24'.46.2N/20'20.4W
North Atlantic Ocean

• 124 nm last 24 hours
  
• 341 nm from Grand Canary
  
• 2328 nm to Barbados
  
• Winds NE 15-25 knots
  
• Seas NE 6-8 feet
  

A great 24hr run for the Piper! We are happy whenever we can make 100 mile days, and everything over that is gravy. The winds have picked up this morning. We now have the main down to a double reef out to starboard, and just a hanky piece of the jib poled out to port. We could put out more sail and make 6-7 knots. But the ride is very rolly, and there is a greater possibility of jibeing the main as we surf off a wave. We are averaging 4-5 knots right now with the wind right off the stern.

Only one ship sighted last 24 hours. It passed one mile off our stern on Amy's watch in the early morning.

A big thanks to everyone that emailed us to wish us well on this passage! If you are new to this site, we can email at sea using SailMail. We run the Sailmail software in our laptop. Th laptop connects to a modem, that is attached to our SSB Marine/Ham radio. We have to find a Sailmail antenna near us to make a connection, and the nearest one is in Belgium (in Europe). The next closest one is in Trinidad (Caribbean). Right now Sandpiper is right between them at over 2000 miles away. Sailmail works better the closer we are to a station. So this means that we might have connection problems until we get closer to Trinidad.

Why did I just explain all this? Just wanted to thank everyone that wrote to us here on the blog because we will not be able to write back until we are getting a better connection. Then we can send multiple emails.

Also, if this blog is not updated every day, then not to worry. It just means we are still sailing along, but cannot connect to Sailmail to broadcast an update.

More in 24,
Tom and Amy