It Blew Hard After the Calm. Across the Ocean to the Canaries

It Blew Hard After the Calm. Across the Ocean to the Canaries Previously — How We Sailed Through Gibraltar By evening, a following wind had sprung up (in Spanish, that sounds like “viento EN POPA”). Overnight, it more than made up for the preceding calms. If the wind hadn’t been “en popa,” we’d have been in serious trouble. 30 knots, and the waves had got all excited too. Running dead downwind. We’re carrying a reefed genoa and staysail, goosewinged. The two autopilots—the windvane and the electronic one—are struggling to cope. Every now and then, a larger-than-usual wave (not 5–6 metres, but about 8), coinciding with a gust of wind, causes the yacht to round up into the wind. The autopilot screams with the effort: “Heeelp! I can’t cope!” The captain dashes to the wheel, disengages the autopilot and steers her back on course by hand. Nastya and I aren’t feeling great, but that doesn’t stop our schoolgirl from watching a great many maths video lessons. Our daughter rounded off her school day with French, much to her mother’s delight. We covered about 150 miles in 24 hours, I think. And if the charts and GPS are to be believed, tomorrow we’ll have the joy of seeing land. Sleeping is difficult. The only place I can manage it is in the wheelhouse, on the watchkeeper’s settee. But the settee is small, and Andrey is on watch. We sleep head-to-toe. Or rather, he keeps watch, alternately dozing off for half an hour and going out into the cockpit to check the sails, while I try to fall asleep. When I was a child, my rather ample granny and I used to sleep like this on trains. Those were not the most magical nights of my life. Sleeping in the double berth in a heavy swell is also practically impossible. What you need here is a narrow cast-iron bathtub lined with mattresses. A cocoon would work too. On a wide berth, your body rolls around completely at random and, at times, unpredictably. So even in a deathlike sleep, your muscles tense one after another, trying to keep the body balanced... on a trampoline. Attached to a swing. Next — The Island That Doesn’t Exist