The sailing today was fast and yet quite pleasant, the wind has continued to back around to the south and east leaving us free to come off the wind a little – we not close hauled anymore. With the wind angle changing from about 40 degree from the bow round to about 80 degrees from the boat lots has changed. The movement of the boat is more comfortable, we don’t lean over as much and we even go slightly faster – all good stuff. We hope this is a trend that will continue over the next few days.
We’re now as close to Galapagos as we are likely to get, in fact we have just clipped the corner of the marine reserve and are now on the west side of the islands. There is no fishing permitted inside the marine reserve, so of course we sailed past a commercial fishing boat busy ‘just outside’ the box on the charts. Being nighttime we had taken in our lines, as Jon doesn’t fancy trying to land, gut and clean a 50lb tuna in the dark. This strategy may change as his desire for sushi increases.
Boat school continues, Mia and Teo spent some time reading together and Jon took a turn teaching him maths with an educational card game he is working on for kids. Teo is doing OK, frustrated with the challenges of living onboard when the world keeps skipping out from under your feet and hard bits of boat jump up to bite you. But he is also enjoying the long lazy mornings snuggling with whomever is sleeping late after the early morning watch. This morning it was Jon’s turn to cuddled by a sleepy Teo – only to be woken instead by a rather excited Teo with a tooth in his hand. A few weeks ago Teo lost a baby front tooth and we knew the second wouldn’t be too far behind. Sure enough the second one got super wobbly and then stuck out and an ‘Alabama’ style angle – and then stayed that way for two weeks! Finally this morning he has gone from looking slightly inbred to super cute, unfortunately he also looks a little comical and we’re having trouble taking him seriously… all I want for Christmas….
Sometime in the after we received a visitor, a big grey/brown bird settled herself on the bow. This is not a trivial feat, especially if they are webbed. We thing he/she is a boobie. This left Teo with a huge problem. The Teo approach to naming the animals which enter our lives is simple, yet effective, you take the type of animal, or a shortened version, and stick an ‘e’ on the end. For example, the Gecko we have kidding onboard is ‘Gecky’, the frog we rescued from the pool at the marina, Froggy. The Puffer fish which hung around the back of Itchy Foot, Puffy. You get the idea. But what about the Boobie? Boobie-y? Jon suggested Bob – Teo was sceptical but in the absence of an alternative it’s stuck.
Bob is resting on the bow. Holding on with webbed feet to a polished (I know, I just polished it) stainless rail, while leaning over and waves come splashing over the top; Oh and now he’s sleeping.
After dinner and before the night watches started we decided to have a family movie night up on deck. Accompanied by Pineapple upside-down cake which Jon baked this afternoon while the rest of the crew worked on the boat bunting. So the laptop was connected to the cockpit speakers and placed infant of the chart plotter, the lights were dimmed we all settled down in the dark to watch ‘Captain Fantastic’. We heartily recommend it. It is not really a kids movie, but these are all words that Teo will hear from either a salty cruiser we meet or whenever Jon is in the engine room trying to fix the generator. Despite the language Teo enjoyed it and so did the rest of us.
Then almost everyone went off to bed as the seas calmed and the wind died a little, in the shadow of the Galapagos islands and slowly making our way down to the equator and the doldrums that await.
