Since early this morning the wind has been building. At around 1600UTC it was blowing sustained over 40 knots, with driving rain and poor visibility. At the time we were planing wildly down the ever increasing waves, at speeds more in double digits than below that. The autopilot, that steers superbly (!!!!), was getting a handful of these wild rides and so I thought it better to switch over to storm sail. I took the main sail down completely, and tied it securely to the boom. Then I hoisted the storm jib, which I had prepared early this morning. So that was just a matter of undoing 1 seizing and pull up the halyard. Well, having done this, and gotten washed in the process, the ride has been remarkably more smooth, with only every now and then a large breaker over the boat. And now, it seems as we are approaching the center of the low. The barometer, that has fallen like a stone since early morning, has remained constant over the last hour, and the wind is back to below 30 knots. It now feels like being becalmed (again!!). And indeed, Huib Swets has been becalmed for 4 hours today, being in the very centre of the depression. According to the grib files, the depression should pass close to my south, sometime late tonight. After that, a very strong northerly wind will come up.

I was informed that JBelino has seen a large iceberg, but he didn't give a position. Let's try not to find it! (Here's another benefit of not going so fast: it give's you some time to react in case of ice. And I'd rather hit something at 5 knots that at 12!) Looks like we're going to have a long, tough night!

But right now, the wind has dropped even more to below 20 knots, and a fog has taken all visibility away. The waves are still quite high, and breaking in all directions. Shall I put up more sail? Or wait till tonight for this strong northerly?

Bart

----------
radio email processed by SailMail
for information see: http://www.sailmail.com