LN894 12/03/2016

So here we are, 1330 on day 5. My watch (Aft Starboard) is on watch.  It is daylight for this watch, which makes a bit of a change from last night when we were steering into the darkness using just the points of the compass and how much rudder helm we had applied.

I am a bit late to the party as I have been on mess duty today.  There have been no sightings of whales or dolphins as yet today.  I am secretly (or not so secretly) quite pleased about this, as I seem to have missed every other whale, dolphin and turtle spotting to date.  Becky from ORCA has joined us on this watch (she is normally in Forward Port), so hopefully that means that we are in good whale spotting ground. Anyway, eyes peeled.

One of the things I was wondering before I came on this trip was who would be on it.  Twenty five days is quite a long time to take off work, and the dates (7-31 March) extend beyond both school and university holidays.  In my watch, our ages range from 19 to 59.  There are 4 men and 3 women: the men have done much better than the women on not being seasick.  In terms of occupation, we have a dinghy instructor, a lawyer, an engineer, a couple of chefs, someone from the IT and banking sectors who is taking a career break, and someone who has taken early retirement and now spends much of his time on a yacht in Greece.  Sailing experience varies hugely.  Many on my watch own their own boats or have done lots of previous trips with JST.  I have probably done the least sailing to date.  The beauty of JST is that we can all pitch in together.  Peter, who has done lots of previous sailing, has spent a lot of time on mess duty over the last few days covering for those of us who have been too sick to do so.  I must confess to feeing slightly jealous of his ability to read a book below deck whilst the ship lurches from side to side.

We have two Swiss, 1 Swede and Brits in my watch, so we are a fairly international group.

Update from the galley- it would seem chocolate pud with chocolate ganache DOES cure sea sickness; and it appears Captain Chris is taking it as a preventative measure too- three portions at the last count!

Keep tracking our progress, the weather gods may decide we don’t stop in The Azores- update tomorrow.