Day 18 - 50 miles to go

June 20, 2008 Friday 9pm - early watch - 38d 19' North 31d 46' West
Today has been quite nice, thank you. We are close hauled (going as upwind as we can go) for the first time in the trip and just laying Flores, 50 miles ahead. We are anticipating a windshift to the NW that will allow us to ease the sheets and go even faster. Right now we have the main with a single reef and the staysail up. That gives us a nice compact sail area and allows the boat to move along like a lady. If the wind should rise, we already have reduced sail so nothing more will be needed. For comfortable living, this is much better than charging along under full sail, a knot faster but heeled over so far that you can barely move around. As I write this, we are doing 6.2K towards our island, so great!
We've been going downwind for 2000 miles and downwind you are running away from the waves, so you meet one every 10 seconds or so. Upwind, you meet one every 4 seconds or less and it is a collision, not a surfing opportunity. That means the motion is rough. Andi is sleeping in the dinette right now as the forward cabin has become untenable due to the motion. I took a nap up there a while ago and discovered that you can get airborne while sleeping - well, you have to be pretty tired! Merritt has the aft cabin where the motion is best, but the dinette is good too.
We should arrive in Flores - harbor of Lajes, in the morning sometime. We are going to anchor and catch up on sleep before going ashore and presenting ourselves to the officials. Since it is a weekend, maybe we will do all that on Monday.
Andi made a delicious meatloaf tonight. With great meals and hot showers, this isn't half bad. Of course, the reason that I needed the shower so badly was that I was working on deck up by the mast when a stray wavetop hit the side of the boat, dousing me with a bucket of salt water. We are running the watermaker, so there is no shortage of sweet water.
I know I'm no Joseph Conrad, but I hope this little chronicle has given you some sense of life aboard the modern cruising sailboat. We're gonna take a picture of the boat in Lajes Harbor with a caption: "bet your house can't do this!"