30-Dec-3008 Noon Position

Atlantic Crossing Day #6
16'06N/36'00W

North Atlantic Ocean
98 nm last 25 hours

637 nm from Cape Verde

1384 nm to Barbados
Winds N 10-15 Knots

Seas N 1-2 feet

Slowwwwwww. We advanced our clocks ahead one hour as the sun is coming up later every morning. That is why we made 98 miles over 25 hours. The last 48 hours has given us some weird weather. A mild low pressure system passed over us during this time and the winds over the last 48 hours have very slowly veered from the normal NE trade wind to east, south, and then yesterday afternoon west. Since west is the way we are going, this put the wind right on our nose. As soon as the wind went dead ahead, we entered an area of mild rain squalls.

We decided to run the engine to keep making forward progress. And at the same time run the water maker and top off the batteries for a nice full charge. We took advantage while motoring to steer away from the heaviest rain squalls and we only passed thru 2 of them. Three hours later the winds kept veering around. As soon as we cleared the rain squalls in the center of the low pressure system, we had winds off the starboard bow and were sailing again.

This whole 48 hours the wind was light and we were lucky if we were making three knots at times. By sunrise the winds were off the starboard beam, and now they are back to the NE and increasing. A complete 360 in 48 hours! 

We have been trying our luck trying to catch the 'Big Daddy Tuna' and got a hit from a small Dorado. This same fish is also called a Dolphin Fish, or Mahi Mahi. The Dorado is a really cool looking fish when caught, with bright green colors all over. But once they die all their color fades away. They also mate for life traveling, with their life partners. So if you are dragging two lures then most likely they will both bite at the same time.

As we hauled in our catch yesterday we saw we had a small Dorado with its mate right behind him/her. The other fish followed the one we hooked right to the edge of the boat and was looking up at us wondering what we were doing with its partner. We felt pretty bad looking down at this now lonely fish swimming alongside us. So we threw its partner back and called it a day. No fish for dinner.

One ship sighted last 24 hours off the stern at sunrise.

More in 24,
Tom and Amy