Our first squall-less day so far. Mosty sunny with a few puffy clouds, but no squalls all day, and a temperature of 92. The winds have been light, too, just 5-10 knots, with very flat seas. This has made for pleasant motor sailing off and on all day, making 6-7 knots with the wind help, and 5-6 without it. And we were thrilled to finally get along the coast of Guyana and out of most of the adverse current.
We are running about 15 miles offshore, in 20 to 30 feet of water.
It’s weird, like you’re just going over a shoal or something, but in fact that’s the way the coast is here for over a hundred miles- very shallow from the shore out about 20 miles. By staying in this shallow water we avoid the bad current farther out. We get little tastes now and then, when a tendril of evil current swirls into our path, disrupting our milky green expanse with the darker waters of the deep.
But at least we are making some progress again.
If things go as expected, there will be some balance in the second half of the voyage, as after rounding the corner of Brazil we should start to see a 1 knot current going with us. So hopefully the pace will pick up then. We are also encouraged about tomorrow and Monday, as the curvature of the coastline suggests we may get an eddy, or at least no bad current.
So what’s the dress code here in the equatorial latitudes? Swim trunks. Day and night, nothing else. Sometimes a T-shirt to avoid getting too much reflected sun and maybe a hat.
Incidentally, our time changed today, moving one hour ahead. This means we are now on the same time as Buenos Aires- 6am in California is 10am on the boat.
08.06N 58.59W 793nm gone, 4019nm to go. 3pm 7/2