This day was just as good as the one before!

I cannot stress enough how lucky we’ve been: no squalls so far, steady wind from exactly the right direction, and a gentle swell. This is trade-wind sailing at its finest.

I’m still amazed every single time I look up at our spinnaker — now flying for the sixth day in a row — that we are actually crossing an ocean under a coloured sail. It feels unreal!

And did I mention already that for a little while we were 3rd in our class??? 

But as reports of halyard failures and broken lines started to pile up in the ARC+ group, we decided to take ours down for inspection. And what can I say… Captain Mark strikes again: nothing to worry about at all, thanks to all the protection he had carefully set up beforehand.

So up it went again! And we even added a bit of mainsail (second reef) as an experiment — partly for a bit more speed, but also as a backup in case a squall surprises us and we need to drop the spinnaker quickly.

The boys had a brilliant day, editing videos with Nelis help of “blowing each other up” with hand grenades (thank you, weird and wonderful apps!), only interrupted by a perfectly timed mahi-mahi that swallowed our lure. It turned into a delicious dinner, pan-seared with sesame seeds and teriyaki sauce.

We even had enough hot water for everyone to enjoy a warm shower — oh, the luxury! Hard to beat when you’re sailing mid-ocean.

We also topped up the batteries using our little generator setup. Normally we rely on our large solar array, but during the crossing the sails sometimes shade the panels, and with the constant motion of the boat, it’s not enough to keep the batteries fully charged — especially since I also cook on induction and run an oven.

And since we didn’t have “lotsamoney” for a Watt & Sea (a water generator, which would have been perfect), we went for the “notsomuchmoney” option: a portable generator that we put on the bow every second day to charge our power bank. A bit of a bush-style setup — but as any Aussie who’s gone bush will tell you: it works like a treat!

Let’s see what this day will bring… it’s all starting to feel a little too good to be true. I’m beginning to worry just a tiny bit!