Day 199, Year 6 Passage to the Carolinas, Day 5-Sailing, Motoring
Date: Wednesday, May 11, 2011
Weather: Beautiful Day, 77 degrees F; Winds N-NW 5-10
Latitude: 25 18.200 N
Longitude: 071 21.088 W
Miles Traveled: 537
Miles to Go: 642
Location: Passage from Puerto Rico to Mainland USA

Just as I ended yesterday’s log, conditions changed drastically and we were able to turn the motor off and sail for ten hours. That ended at about 3:30 am and then we were back to motoring. The last time we had to do this much motoring was on our passage from Tonga to New Zealand, but in that case we didn’t have wind and seas coming exactly from the direction we were headed. This is really a slooooow slog. We haven’t made 120 miles in any 24 hour period and neither of us can remember going this slow except on our trip from Norfolk to St. Martin in 2005. In that case we had huge seas and wind on the nose and we felt like we were crawling up and down mountains of water for days on end. At least the seas are not that rough this time and the wind is not as strong, but it is a bit frustrating. We have had positive current with us on and off, but never more than half a knot. But about an hour ago, we all of a sudden have a little more than a knot of positive current. It would be wonderful if that would stay with us. But we are still hopeful that we will arrive late next Tuesday afternoon, May 17th, in time for Mark’s Wednesday morning appointment. We have used one tank of fuel, but two more to go, so we should be able to motor all the way if necessary. So onward we go.