15/01/13 - Lord Nelson

R.. d. J...... is now a word not spoken on Lord Nelson, but now everyone's cabin fever is starting to settle now we are at sea. Not quite sailing yet (motor sailing), we did put up the sails for a whole 2 hours early on. Land last seen days ago and the only other human contact was a racing yacht, sailing from New York to San Francisco 2 days ago. Sunny again at last letting us get on with some ships maintenance - lots of sanding and varnishing going on.

We have so far travelled 626 nautical miles in last 4 days, so Captain Chris is happy that we are on course to get to Cape Town in time for flights etc But keeps requesting for someone to deliver a NW Force 6 wind - no luck yet.

We are all getting into the ships routine, and getting over sea sickness.

As there is now a total of 20 voyage crew and we have managed to stick to a 4 watch system - (+sea sickness) some watches only have 3 people on them - lots of time to helm and look out at empty sea.

So far we have had Steve's sail setting talk and today we had a sextant talk and got to practice at 13:20 -Captain Chris got the nearest, (but he was the judge as well). The only other happening of the day is the first mate had a free haircut, the fact that he still has both ears shows that the barbarity was not open to all comers. A brief announcement on the tannoy fell on deaf ears as nobody knew what the five pounds was for. It mentioned the Captain's Cup! Was this anything to do with the previous Brazilian oil crisis, hints that we may not make it on time unless there is some dosh up front, or will that be the spot rate for a single cigarette about a week from Cape town? Tennessee Ernie Ford had a hit record in the 50's titled "I owe my soul to the Company Store". Cadets, don't say you haven't been warned.....

Oh, we've just had a man overboard drill, poor old headless Fred has once again been saved from a watery grave.
People are still whistling on board, damn you Jonah's.

Aft Port, somewhere in the Southern hemisphere.