The sun rose on the sparkling sea this morning, to reveal that our rig was about to fall down. Guillermo Altadill, walking forward after his trick on the helm, happened to look up, and noticed that the large pin securing a link plate in the shrouds, had wandered part of the way out of it’s mounting. Pausing briefly for a few Hail Mary’s, we jibed, took a hammer to it, and restored our rigging to it’s normal integrity. At some time, probably during our fifty knot upwind slog to the start, the split pin securing the big rigging pin in place had sheared, and the big pin had been slowly leaving the boat ever since. Had we jibed and unloaded the pin, our return jibe might have been made memorable by the graceful descent of the rig and sailplan. Thanks to the sharp eyed Catalan, we are not, at this writing, paddling to the Canaries.

Sailing today is pleasant, but not very fast. We are sailing downwind angles, jibing on shifts. The wind has picked up some this morning, but the pace is still a bit docile. Adrianne assures that we are sailing into more wind, and we hope she is right. No accurate position fix on OdsK. We expect that he is totally becalmed somewhere around Madiera, wishing he had taken up accoutancy in his youth, rather than sailing.

Picture by Claire Bailey