July 16th, 20:00 pst

This boat is wet, wild and fast. She comes alive in 18 knots or more and then flies. But she’s really wet. Very wet. Check out the pictures. When it looks wet in the pictures, you know that it was wet! As the sun comes down, the wind pulled back from low twenties to low teens. It’s probably the diurnal effect. We are still sailing with our three sail combination: big roached main, big genoa and genoa staysail. If the wind stays light after sunset, we will put a reaching kite on a spinnaker staysail and sail a little lower. The weather pattern is getting more complex. The South looks trickier and trickier, but we’re committed. No risk, no reward!

So it’s time to switch to the warm gear for the night and get ready for wet, cold and dark. It will be a no moon dark night. However all the stars should be out and that will be spectacular! We’ll take celestial shots at Jupiter, Altair and Polaris. Now I must find them in the sky.