From: OmanTri
Date: Thu, 12 Mar 2009 02:09:13 -0000
To: update
Subject: Thursday Morning

Sun rise here in the indian ocean, to stbd we have the sun coming up
quickly, and I am sure we’re in for a hot one today, out to our port side a
fairly full moon stilll high in the sky. Very nice conditions though up wind
in light airs (8kts). Last night we had some incredible cloud fun.Gettting
stuck under a couple of massive ones with torential rains, and huge shifts
and increases and decreased in wind strength. Big blasts of warm and then
cold air – full on doldrums conditions. In one 3 hour period we fairly
constantly changed sails, Genoa , Solent, Bare Head, Solent, Genoa, then
ended up with 1 reef. All this with torrential rains. Hooch was asleep in
the bunk below the cockpit floor, and had to listen to the winches turning
almost constantly, going through the gears on the winch – we have 3 per
winch, plus the ability to engage an over drive to give a total of 6
different gear ratios. That’s what the doldrums is all about – I am sure
most people think of periods of no wind – just sails slatting and going no
where with nothing to do, but there is more work to do during the light airs
than during the heavy airs just to keep the boat moving.

During the day yesterday our progress was very slow, and we set the fishing
line. It’s not really a normal thing to do on a record attempt, but our
speed was so slow that (like the time off new zealand) it seems crazy not to
give it a go – especially as we were just by a shallow bank where we knew
fish would gather. Sure enough after a while the line went tight, and mohsin
was able to land a sizeable fish – not quite as big as our Kiwi catch, but
plenty big enough for everyone to have a good feed, and second helpings. Our
Kiwi catch was cut up in the steaks, where as this fish was prepared by
Mohsin who efficiently ( with an all too blunt knife!) gutted and filleted
the fish making some good steaks for Loik to cook. It was a welcome
addition to our food program today, and it was a welcome distraction to the
doldrums. Mohsin was a bit worried he might become more well known for being
a fisherman than a sailor, but hopefully everyone understands how unusual it
was to be fishing!!!

Generally our stores are holding up well, our pile of empty grey food bags
is quite big now, we have coverted their contents in to energy,and white
garbage bags which we store up forward for disposal on land. We only have
one 5 day bag left in the back of the boat, and two under the generator
floor – a very graphic reminder how long we have been going. remember no
stops, no resupply, if it wasn’t onboard when we left, we have done
without it.
We have learned a lot about what we would take next time, and what we would
leave behind. It’s one of the benefits of the OmanSail project that the
lessons we learn will help make future trips better, faster, more efficient,
and easier to plan. Where as traditional sailing programs gather people
together for the period of the challenge, afterwards eveyone moves on to
different projects, never really capitalizing on the collective knowledge.
Keeping this line of development open over a period of years will make it
possible to make well informed decisions about what works, and what doesn’t.

Now that we are back in warmer climates, the battery charging is more
efficient, and the watermaker makes water a may be twice the rate than the
colder waters of the southern ocean – this is great as it meant we could
draw off a couple of buckets of fresh water to wash with, a real luxuary,
and in the last hour of darkness I managed a bucket bath in the cockpit.
It’s incredible how fresh the soap smells after so long relying on wet
wipes. I think when we hit land we are going to have a sensory overload,
with the sights, noises and smells of land hitting us hard. we’ll be ready
for it, and also to see some new faces other than those 4 we have been
looking at onboard for the last 2 months.