Day 56

@1630 hrs.

Pos: 54’s.27” 64’w.52”
Run to date: 6278miles
Course: 170’
Pressure: 986.9
Air temp: 8c
Wet temp: 6.5c
Sea temp: 7.9c

Well landlubbers, our voyage is rapidly coming to an end, and so is the blog for this trip. You can feel the atmosphere slowing down. On board, we’ve started to get ready for Ushuaia. A brave group of voyage crew went up the foremast to harbour stow the sails. The sea state became very ‘lumpy’ and the fore t’gallant and main mast stow has been left until tomorrow sometime.

We are still motoring and we are about ten miles from the Estrecho De La Maire, and our transit through the narrows. We should get through with the wind and the tide in our favour, and if we don’t there it will be a very bumpy night for anyone trying to get a kip.

We will be at anchor tomorrow night in the Beagle Channel awaiting the pilot for our transit through to Ushuaia. It’s also the evening of the ships SODS’s Opera (Sailor’s operatic and drama society)! Each watch as been writing their scripts and rehearsing their lines on the foredeck or anywhere else they think they can get a bit of exclusive privacy.

This afternoon at 1600hrs, the ship’s theatre wardrobe was thrown open to the crew in readiness for the Opera. I could describe some of the costumes……………but I’ll post photos after the event.

Finally, Marcin, our second officer, was fooling around on the foredeck this afternoon. Watchleader Paul was ‘GoProing’ him stripping off and boasting that real sailors didn’t need all these layers of clothes to be ‘real sailors’. In the middle of his rant, ‘Nellie’ dug deep at the bow and sent a huge amount of spray down the deck towards him. He took one look at what was coming and’ legged’ it in blind panic to a dry refuge. All filmed and awaiting You Tubing in the very near future. I hope you will keep an eye out for it – it’s hilarious!

Fore Port Watch: Sherwood w/l, Jen, Babs, Bridget, Gary, Paul, Dave and Mike.