These posts start to become like 'Ground Blog Day' as there isn't a lot to write about when your sailing like this. The wind was pretty light during the night, and we ran with one engine and the headsail to try and grab a bit of extra speed - by extra speed I mean 1 knt so around 2kph! There were a few ships coming up and down the channel, and it was nice to see the lights of Suva as we went past.
Around 6am, we gradually got a few extra knots of wind as we cleared the islands of Fiji, and we are now running downwind with just the headsail and surrounded by big grey clouds. Its good to be away from the land and reefs again and in to open water. The islands do add a new dimension and its something to look at. But as I have said loads of times 'all the wrecks are on the rocks' so its definitely more relaxing to be away from charted objects labelled "2 miles further". Plus its 499nm to Port Vila which is very exciting. We aren't going exactly the right way as we have the wind at 150degrees off the port quarter and cant turn further to starboard/Port Vila so we will have to make up the difference later. The forecast is showing very light winds on Wednesday so we can probably motor the right way and get back the miles we lost chasing wind.
We have been making good miles since we left Tonga, generally doing around 150 to 165 nm a day. And I realised I have absolutely no idea how long we have been sailing since we left. The days just blur into one another.
Days are spent being busy doing nothing, and everything takes much longer at sea than it does at home.
Opening a cupboard takes two hands because you have to be careful the door doesn't slam closed on your fingers. Doing the dishes involves making strategic piles, like trying to rebuild a Jenga tower so everything doesn't fall over on the floor.
If you take a tin or cup out of the cupboard, you have to make sure the void you just made is filled with something so things don't slide around and bang.
A loose battery in a cupboard, for example, can drive you nuts at 3am. Every now and again, if there is a larger wave, it will roll across the cupboard and hit the other side.
Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr... donk.
Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr... donk.
And then nothing happens for 10 minutes while you try to find it. You get distracted, go outside to check the wind, and hear:
Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr... donk.
So you go back inside, look everywhere, can't find it, give up and go back to whatever you were doing.
Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr... donk.
Eventually you find it, wedge it in somewhere, and congratulate yourself on having solved the problem.
Until 3am the next morning when you discover there is another one.
It's amazing how much time can be spent doing very simple things when the floor is moving underneath you.
And that's probably why I have no idea how many days we've been sailing. You can be incredibly busy all day and, at the end of it, have absolutely no idea what you actually did.