A slow progress day. We knew this would be a tough spot, as the equatorial current can run very strong to the northwest here, as much as 4 knots offshore. Which is why we stayed very close to the coast of Trinidad, looking for current relief, and after rounding it are trying to get the coastline of Venezuela for the same reason. I think the worst we saw was about 2 knots against us, which doesn’t sound like much, but makes a 6-knot sail into a 4-knot slog, and with the very light and flukey winds we experienced, sometimes turned a 4-knot sail into almost no progress at all. Being sailors, we were too reluctant to turn on the engine, and thus had a very very slow day.
There were a few times we did finally motor for 45 minutes or so, as the wind died completely and we didn’t want to drift back to Grenada.
All in all I think we are through the worst of it, but we are still seeing over a knot against us as we head south to the shoreline, but there is some improvement already as I write this. By this evening we will be on the shoreline and hopefully making better progress.
We had an amazing lightning storm last night, and really close, too.
Some flashes were so close everything just went white, and you couldn’t even tell where it was, as the flash was all around us. Some jagged bolts lit up your retinas and you saw shadows of it for hours.
We were glad to be surrounded by tall oil rigs, that’s for sure!
Today has brought the usual passing squalls, along with sunshine and day and night temps in the mid-80’s. This afternoon we are finally seeing some better breeze, thankfully, so we can start making progress again. We’re in the single digit latitudes!
09.32N 60.20W 659nm gone, 4129nm to go. 3pm 7/1