Monday 6 October – dolphins see us out the pass as we head to Indonesia

We were the last boat to get going just after 7am. As we were heading to the pass we saw some dolphins arrive, within minutes the flat calm water was boiling with dolphin activity, they must be some kind of spinner dolphin as they leap in the air and do spectacular flips. The water was so clear we could see to the ground below them. What a wonderful way to leave, there must have been nearly 100 dolphins, it always feels like they are having so much fun. As we got into the pass they all peeled off and went back into the atoll.

The sea was as flat as a pancake and no sign of any wind, it was motors on. We motored the majority of the day in boiling heat, it gets so hot without a breeze. Shocked to see the water temperature get to 33.3 degrees. We headed north west for about 15miles to catch the current which gave us an extra knot of speed and at times up to an extra 1.7 knots. Mid morning Claudette spotted whales near her, we were about 2 miles away, sadly they never came our way.

We had Pinkz up for a little while, but with loads of squalls lurking about, we got her down and put away. We put a reef in the main sail, and that sent the little wind we had packing. Mid afternoon Rowan caught a beautiful MahiMahi, he got it onto the boat, it was thrashing about like crazy, we poured the last of our cheap rum on it, but it somehow managed to get the hook off and slid off the sugar scoop. Very relieved Rowan didn’t chase it overboard! What a disappointment, we were already whooping with delight at the thought of sashimi. There were a lot of birds about which is always a good sign of fish, we went through an area where loads of fish were jumping and the birds were going crazy, but never got another bite from any fish.

The storms predicted for the evening never materialised either. I did the first shift which was very easy in these calm seas.