Channels...

Definition of Channels: the night before returning back to home port, that something feeling that keeps you up after being out at sea for sometime"

Everyone has the Channels this evening.....We have great winds now which are pushing us along at over 8 knots, so the miles are just going fast. We are about to arrive in English Harbour, Landfall early tomorrow morning (with luck). I suppose this will concludes our sail across the Atlantic for this year. Essentially take out our stop over in Cape Verde's It took 17 days to cross from The Gambia in Africa to Antigua in the Caribbean, a distance of about 2,800 nautical miles as the crow flies. All down-wind with the current to our back. Our average speed over ground was about 6. 5 knots so we traveled about 165 miles per day. Our best day was 201 miles. We used the engine a little too much during our last week racking up almost a 100 hours, alot considering most will not use their engines at all.....plus we have only 900 hrs total on our engine.

Average wind speed was 10 knots (kind of light), and the winds seldom exceeded 20 knots or dipped below 6 knots. After almost six months without rain, we were delighted to get a few pours offered on by Mother Nature as we approached Antigua. Kids really enjoyed the colorful double rainbows.

Fishing would have been good, but without our reel, I settled with just teasing the kids with the flying fish that landed on our decks, cockpit, and head on an almost daily basis.