Friday 3.45pm Making just 2kt - drifting in almost no wind, trying to head NE... frustrating!
Later - changed course to head NNW - Low pressure system coming is set to deepen rapidly and give strong winds ahead - so trying to avoid worst of it by not heading E.
Sunset - Heaved to with 3rd reef tied in. Drifting WSW at about 1.3kt. Nice to be able to sort out the boat in light winds and swell, preparing for the strong conditions coming up... Feeling very relaxed! Might be able to catch up now on the many emails waiting for me to reply to...!
Making a lot of Argentinian radio contacts now, many from Buenos Aires - nice to try out my (bad) Spanish which they don't seem to mind!
10:30pm So quiet and peaceful, hove to like this.. Definitely feeling like "the lull before the storm" - although this should not be too bad - heavy weather, rather than a real storm.
Enjoyed some delicious smoked wild salmon tonight - canned in Nanaimo - absolutely wonderfully tasty! Followed that with some nice chocolate - Rogers, of course! Christmas gifts from friends.
Swell is slightly more noticeable now - sign of winds on their way.
Saturday - soon after dawn. Woke up from a good sleep with sun shining in to the cabin - I actually felt too warm and had to remove my warm hat...! We'd drifted in a circle overnight - but only at under 1 kt. Cloud cover 50%, seas well down, at maybe just over 2m/6ft. Wind increased to about 15kt maybe (guesstimate since have no way to measure just now).
9.30am Bright sun, 20% cloud with big bank of white cloud to NW. Noticeable swell running from NNW, but not close together, so we're just rocking gently. Drifting just N of due W, at 1.4kt. Position is still just S of where we heaved to yesterday, so that's fine for now.
Time for late breakfast with some fresh coffee.... and then those emails, maybe.
Midday Delighted to have totally caught up with replies to emails! Feels good to be up to date just now, although not all have been sent. There were a lot of them and the radio connection this time of day is not the best - so quite a few will have to wait until tonight, when propagation is better. Made good use of time waiting around while hove to.
Seems we might be able to get underway again tomorrow afternoon - when the wind backs to the WSW-SW, the Low will have passed by and we'll be able to make a course to the NE - but keeping an eye out for the next lot of strong wind....
1900GMT (=1400LT) - end of Day 87. We drifted 14 n.ml. DMG over the 24 hr period, measured in a straight line between the two 1900 GMT positions.
Total distance covered from Victoria, B.C., to end of Day 87 (by daily DMGs): 8,636 n.ml.
Distances (at 1900Z): Cape Horn LH: 710 n.ml. to SW; Falklands: 280 n.ml. to SW; Buenos Aires: 855 n.ml to NNW
Position & weather report for 1900 GMT posted to Winlink.org and Shiptrak.org (using my US callsign KC2IOV):
TIME: 2018/12/29 19:00GMT LATITUDE: 48-12.82S LONGITUDE: 052-35.51W COURSE: 214T SPEED: 0.7kt
WIND_SPEED: 25kt WIND_DIR: N SWELL_DIR: N SWELL_HT: 3.5m CLOUDS: 100%
BARO: 1000.9hPa TREND: -2 AIR_TEMP: 15.0C SEA_TEMP: 11.0C
COMMENT: Hove to