Friday, October 31, 2008

Approachiing Gulf Stream

All is well with the ship and crew.

I don't know if anyone listened to the southbound herb broadcast on the internet but it was a real cliffhanger. Herb was watching 2 low pressure systems and trying to decide which was dominant. If one was dominant, we would be heading to North Carolina for shelter, and if the other was dominant, we could make it to Bermuda if we move along. So for the entire
first day we did not know whether we were headed to Bermuda or North Carolina. When we reached Herb yesterday, we had already made 3 degrees of progress south (about 180 miles) and were not about to go back to New England, because we discovered that it is warmer here.

Herb says the neither has fully established it's dominance, but even if we get a bad break and storms head to Bermuda, we should be able to get there first. We should arrive Sunday Night to Monday morning, and it would arrive Monday evening.

IF it forms, and IF it beats us there it will be bad, but not terrible. Herb says gale force to weak storm. We have been sailing through the night on a "fresh breeze" to "weak gale" which is only a little worse than the gale force to weak storm he is calling for. Still, we won't be stopping for any kiteboarding sessions on the Gulf Stream.

In a few hours we will enter the Gulf Stream. Conditions are very good for this.

Some things we learned so far:

Turns out that if you boil bagged frozen pea soup in a pressure cooker, the bag explodes inside the pressure cooker and makes a mess. Four day old underwear is not as bad as it sounds.

You get a lot more well wishes and congratulations from your google group right after you leave, and it clogs up your ability to send and receive email, even though you are just retrieving the headers It is cold in New England in November. Especially on the water. Even the
Canadians say so.

ttyl