Thursday February 28th

Today was actually a lovely day, the sailing was fabulous, we had 18 knots of wind and managed a gentle, smooth 7 knots of speed from Pachea down the island chain of Las Perlas to San Jose. With both the main and the Genoa out in full use, I sat back in the director’s seat sipping my margarita, and watching Bob and Graeme deep in a discussion about the science of sailing.

It makes such a difference for me when we have crew, and I’m just chef; life is so much easier and less stressful, I don’t feel nervous when we have others aboard, especially when they’re competent sailors like Graeme and Ed, I’m able to relax and enjoy what we’re doing. As usual there were thousands of birds, but sadly no dolphins.

I put my fishing line out, and Edi hauled in a beautiful Wahoo, which Bob told me to kill and fillet, he said if I wanted to fish I had to deal with it. Fair enough. I tried hard not to get too emotional as I held its struggling body and Graeme poured the vodka into its gills to kill it quickly. I was quick to remove its head and tail and bleed it out, but I couldn’t help shuddering inside each time the fish jumped and moved. I had to do this, I enjoy eating fish, so I should be prepared to kill them, and at least it was quick.

We’re all looking forward to a delicious fish dinner tonight; I just have to decide what to serve it with. We didn’t put the line out again today; I think its only fair to catch what we can eat.

Today has been such fun, lovely weather really relaxing and enjoyable, I have a horrible, sinking feeling that this could be the calm before the storm! Tomorrow morning we are up early to finally set off for the Galapagos…