Winds continued to be light and baffling throughout the night. At one point a breeze sprang up from the north east, prompting us to wear ship, but it died away again to calm shortly thereafter.
It wasn’t until about 6am that a south-easterly came on, and as the seas had come down enough for us to carry sail without beating it to death we put the ship under full sail and ran out the Studding Sail booms on the port tack and ran up the sails. This may very well be the last time of the passage that we will be able to set the Studding Sails. With the constant march of low pressure systems off of the continent we are going to have stronger winds and, when we don’t, they are just as likely to be head winds. But for at least one last chance it is nice to be able to see the ship ‘spread her wings’ as it were one more time.
While our Royal yards were down we did a thorough inspection on them and serviced their gear. Upon close inspection of the Main Royal yard some deterioration was found that lead us to condemn it. We carry timbers along with us for just such an eventuality and by early afternoon we had the blank sized off for the Royals unlashed and getting marked up for a new spar. These blank timers that we carry started out with us last fall, when we went traipsing out into the woods in Nova Scotia to find suitable trees for spare T’gallant and Royal yards. Having identified them, we had them cut down, sent to the mill to be squared off to eliminate the sapwood and then carefully stowed onboard.
With one Royal yard still strong and ready to go we got ready to cross it on the main mast and soon had it secure aloft ready for sail to be bent, which was also completed that afternoon.
In the late afternoon the wind increased to Force 5 and veered Southwest, so in came many of the kites and we hauled the ship up on the wind for the night making as much as we could toward the west in expectation of West and Northwest winds in the coming days.
SHIP’S WORK: Shift Main Upper Topsail ‘E’ for ‘DK-16’; cross Main Royal Yard and bend Royal ‘F’; caulking on quarterdeck; continue work on new MONOMOY main boom; begin work on new Fore Royal yard; replace STBD Inner Jib sheet; Sailmaker repair Spanker ‘C’ and the Lower Studding Sail.
FROM: La Rochelle, France
TOWARDS: Quebec, Canada
TIME ZONE: ZD +2
NOON POSITION: 37°08’N / 053°29’W
DAYS RUN: 56nm
PASSAGE LOG: 3501nm
DISTANCE REMAINING: 1002nm
COURSE AND SPEED: W, 4kts
WIND: SE, Force 4
WEATHER: Overcast with occasional sun, air temp: 24°C, water temp: 25°C
SWELL HEIGHT & DIRECTION: N’rly, 2 – 4ft
SAILS SET: All Sail