Position Report- High Seas


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Crossing from Sardinia (Calaforte) to Sicily (Winter Quarters- change of plan!!)

Departure date Sunday 30th September, 2018 at noon. Eta 9am Wednesday 3rd October 2018

Tuesday 2nd October Noon
Current Position: 37 33.61 N 12 32.78 E
Speed: 5.1 knots
Course: 119 deg
Noon to Noon run 115nm (Same as previous 24 hours, mostly all under sail, still not bad for an old girl in these big sea conditions)

All well on board.

Large quartering sea (approx 1.5-2metres), occasionally breaking still with us most of the day, easing a little overnight.

Notable events, a dolphin jumped out of a breaking wave amidships by our cockpit, at about head height, to have a good look at the skipper on watch. Nearly gave him a heart attack!!

We also saw a large lonesome turtle, who stopped to look at us as we surfed by, plenty of flying fish coming out of the big waves, fantastic luminous green phosphorescence in our bow wave as we plunged into the troughs. I also saw a glowing electric blue jellyfish on the 3am shift. This last one could have of course been sleep deprivation or a lack of beer?!

Wind was constant 10 – 25 knots from behind again, dying off as we rounded the south west corner of Sicily, after it got the last laugh of course. We had a Force 8 thunder squall at 5am, Emerald took off like a scalded cat at 8 knots, whilst the skipper frantically shortened sail!!!

So far it has been an eventful passage, big waves, big winds, lots of sea life, thunderstorms, and now we’ve completely lost the wind with 100nm to run. We may also have a tad of added jeopardy, with disagreeing forecasts at arrival time tomorrow. One says no wind (thank you we shall believe that model!), and the other says 10-20 knots on the nose for the last hour or so before arrival (no thank you, especially at the entrance to the port). However if we don’t keep going the window closes and we may be stuck for 4 or 5 days trying to get east.

We have 20 hours of diesel to burn, but that first beer will be worth it!

Happy October everyone.

Emerald crew a.k.a M0EMR maritime mobile