Friday, 21st May 2004
Noon Position : N W
Course 040 degrees Speed 16 knots Days Run : 358 miles
Weather : Fine, very clear and sunny but not too hot. Wind : 250 degrees 18 knots
News: Wow – an all time record for the days run – just shy of a 15 knot average for 24 hours!! This includes the three times we had to stop for the fishing – Thank you Gulf Stream.
The wind died off yesterday morning and we motored in a glassy calm but still doing over 14 knots with the help of the Gulf Stream. We hooked into two nice Mahi Mahi but lost one at the gaff, the other was about 20lbs and what we don’t have for lunch today is in the freezer. No other hits as it is hard in such calm water and also had a lot of Sargasso Weed which fouls the hooks.
We saw pilot whales several times and came across a nuclear submarine stopped on the surface. They had a lot of people on deck and may even have been taking a swim but we weren’t close enough to be sure. It certainly was big and scary looking.
Overnight we continued much the same and made excellent speed. This morning the stream was even stronger and we were making 17 knots for several hours and once even saw 17.7 on the GPS. We now have some wind from the port quarter so have all the sails out as we approach the notorious Cape Hatteras. We landed another Mahi of similar size this morning so we are no longer fishing as it is difficult to stop with all the sails out. Unfortunately the wind coming from abaft the beam is not quite strong enough to let us turn off the engine and only use sail power.
We will probably lose the current about 150 miles after the Cape but should still make it into Boston on Sunday afternoon, about half a day ahead of schedule, which will be nice as we can get a head start on the big clean up.
PW
