Chris Blog Day 12

Blog post from Chris:

"We think it is day 12, an excellent day of rowing after being on the para anchor for another 12-15 hours overnight, the rest was welcome, but not the loss of ground. Having said that, looking at it positively we only lost around 32 nautical miles to the South East over both sessions on the anchor. In the right conditions half a day lost to regain it, and throughout today we have pushed to get back on track.

The cabins are far from comfortable, and as we found out last night the torrential downpours meant water was dripping from various locations. Our water test with the hose onshore only picked up a few of them. We did however still get stacks of sleep, and a rest from the 2 hours on 2 hours off routine.

Seeing the sunfish yesterday was cool, first marine life we have seen close up. Another week and we will need to think about cleaning the bottom of the boat, we are sure to see some marine life below the waterline.

We are rowing WNW to get ahead of this weather front, searching for SE winds to help drive us North. The picture opposite is a large patch of current heading to the South East. On the 20th of May we had been in this current for around 24 hours. We certainly felt it in the boat speed; the boat felt double the weight! After being blown / drifting South we believe we are at the bottom end of it.

Finally, I would like to thank some of my technical trade work colleagues for their contribution to the row boat. With thanks to Kev Rennie for your sterling job welding the trailer and carrying out other repairs on it. With many thanks to Anth Kowalczyk for your expert assessment and repair work on the carbon repairs. Many thanks to Ranjeet Ramu for your work on the electrics installation and thanks to Dale Henegan and Daniel Glassborow for your help with the auto and hydraulic steering.

The weather outlook is good for us moving forward."

Chris