Just another trade-wind Monday. There are now at least four sailmakers working on the quarterdeck at any one time, and four or five carpenters working midships getting Karl planked up, or planning down the mast on the port side of the well deck. The starboard well-deck is a cat’s cradle of footropes and cranelines getting inspected and served and seizings replaced as required. There’s a little clear water, toe high, splashing across the main deck, which keeps it nice and cool and refreshing on the feet – not like the quarterdeck which is too hot to go barefoot in the middle of the day in these tropics. The watch are mostly varnishing now, making the most of the hot sun to get plenty of coats on, and then at noon four or five people appear with sextants to shoot the sun. There’s usually a navigator or two taking the stars at twilight too.
SHIP’S WORK: Spanker craneline maintenance; seaming upper topsail; KARL planking, spar and sailmaking; coats of varnish on the quarterdeck rails; scrape, sand and vanish the aft galley house trim; varnish helm grates; continue to assemble the new pilot ladder. The watches drilled in taking in and re-setting the stu’n’s’ls overnight.
FROM: Mindelo, Sāo Vicente, Cape Verde
TOWARDS: The West Indies
TIME ZONE: ZD+3
NOON POSITION: 15°36.7’N /055°03.2’W
DAYS RUN: 93nm
PASSAGE LOG: 1,838nm
DISTANCE REMAINING: 329nm
COURSE AND SPEED: West by South (CMGT 260°T)
WIND: Force 3, East
WEATHER: 2/8 cloud cover (cumulus), air temp 82F (28°C), barometer reading 1019 millibars, visibility good
SWELL HEIGHT & DIRECTION: approx 2-4 feet, East
SAILS SET: All square sails to the royals, fore lower, topmast and t’gallant studdingsails, fore topmast staysail, inner jib, outer jib, main topmast staysail, main t’gallant staysail; braced up a point on the port tack under a cloud of canvas.