Life at sea

All I can see is sea, sea and more sea! And stars at night!

We're over nearly 3 days into our journey to Galapagos, and touchwood we're still waiting for the next significant fault on the boat!

We have done quite well over the first couple of days, finding wind most of yesterday when much of the rest of the fleet was reporting none so were having to motor, and we've caught up with the back of the fleet. 

We did run out of wind yesterday afternoon, we initially had to change from orange to blue sail (which works better in very light winds) then the wind dropped completely and we did have to motor overnigh. But wind has picked up this morning so we're sailing again, although wind is now from the wrong direction so we're having to tack into it, so white sails today!

It's cloudy today, still very hot but something of a relief from yesterday, when the decks were too hot to stand on! (apologies to anyone in colder climates wishing it was warmer!)

Some yachts still don't have wind, and also don't have enough fuel to motor to Galapagos, but other boats are offering spare fuel to help out. 

We haven't seen too much wildlife although we did see a turtle's head pop up yesterday afternoon,and we saw a butterfly - both 250 miles from land!! Were they lost, how did they get here?! We've also had a few dolphins for company.

One of the boats has had a wonderful close encounter with two large whales, right next to them. Ironically it was one of the boats that has had to turn back, and they saw the whales very close to Panama, a small consolation for their problems. 

Another caught a Marlin but were very relieved when it managed to get off their hook. And another has hooked 2 small sharks but managed to return both to the sea without getting bitten. No such sightings for us!

We're creeping closer and closer to the equator, we're now at a latitude of less than 3 degrees, which is surreal. Wondering what we have to do to keep Neptune happy when we do finally cross the equator!

Off now to plan what we'll do when we do reach Galapagos in a few days - can't believe we're getting so close!