1/1/12

Noon Position 33 52' S, 085 01' W, SOG 0, COG ???, Day's run 30nm. I
find myself drifting into the new year on a smooth sea - too smooth of a
sea, actually. I've been struggling through this high pressure system
for quite some time now, only to have it move along with me just as I
thought I'd escaped out the east side of it. My day's have become a
tedium of raising and lowering sail, trying to catch the least breath of
air but still preserve them from the chafe and slatting of a boat
rolling about totally becalmed. I spend most of my time reading trashy
novels or trying to eke a few tenths of a knot or a few degrees of
height out of the sordid little puffs of wind that despoil the sky's
reflection. There have been moments of beauty as well: A morning spent
sailing gloriously at 4 kts, watching a peck of stormy petrels feeding
in my wake, slapping at the surface of the sea with one dainty
outstretched foot, while in the distance a wandering albatross loomed
like a somber giant of the skies. A sky full of amber fire, lighting up
a trail across a smoothly undulating sea of glass, broken only by the
crowns of tiny portuguese man-o-wars. The breath of dolphins at
midnight, harsh against the still night air, the sea lit by their
glowing track. And today, a pair of whales, not even pausing to
consider the awkward intruder that flailed about on the surface of the
sea, sails slapping in time to the sea. But mostly, I eat, read and
sleep, willing that the dreary hours be broken by a breath of wind.