Dawn, day 3

Well, if the past week has told us anything, it is that weather
forecasts are not necessarily accurate!

After the days of plotting and predicting the track of ex-hurricane
Leslie the various grib models still couldn't quite agree where (s)he
would make landfall - and they were all wrong anyway! Landfall was
earlier than most models predicted and a bit further north - saving
us from the worst of it. It was fun watching 'Life of Brian' while
also keeping any eye of the weather. The wind (inside the marina)
peaked at F9 then abruptly dropped to about 15kn before going back
up to gale force from the other direction. The pressure,
meanwhile, dropped to 1004 then rose back up to 1008 during the
film!

Since our departure the forecasts haven't been great either. As we
left there was the predictable swell but whereas the forecast had the
wind moving to the west F5 - What we got was steady F7 gusting 9 with
us trying to get as close to the wind was we could. We have a really
great crew and Tintin coped faultlessly, but we were all somewhat jaded
by last night.

Happily, the wind has moderated and backed and we're even getting the
occasional glimpse of sunshine so morale is on the way up again and
sea-sickness is less - but it's still oilies, lifejackets and clicked on
it the cockpit.

Currently 287Nm from Funchal. Eta Thursday early.