AQP blog
For the past week we have been sailing in a cold front, south of a low pressure. In a cold front the skies are patchy with rain clouds that are big and blocky, but not towering equatorial ones full of convective energy. These blocky clouds can rotate, so their aspect changes making it harder to determine whether you will be rained on or escape the squally downdrafts.
Thinking celestially, we get 14 hours of daylight, and the moon is waxing to fullness. Since Max and I work in UTC, 6 hours on 6 hours off, daylight shifts for each of us as we travel eastwards. At this point I get on watch at dusk and dawn, and get to experience a full sky, no trees, no hills, no buildings to block the great views. The sunlight illuminates the showery clouds creating golden backdrops. Rainbows*, occasionally moonbows'*, sun halos and moon halos populate the sky. Any chaos from kitemares, or inner struggles of life at sea are soothed by this beauty.
For photographers, these times are known as the golden hour. Dawn brings hope of warmer better conditions, dusk a mellowness as we eat dinner, and our bodies start to naturally wind down. There is a children's book called The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, in which a boy lives on a small planet and decides to move his chair to see the sunset multiple times. As a sailor I want to stay in dusk for as long as possible, unfortunately for us, we are travelling around the world the wrong way.
On another note, most of the blokes on board have not shaved. There are many different varieties of beard on board, some like lumberjacks (scruffy), naturalists (long and scruffy) and guitarists (scruffy goatees, there are gaps). All well-trimmed for media ;). As someone who has struggled in the past to grow a tash for Movember, I hope to have done my family and friends proud over the month at sea. Looking forward to seeing you in Seattle with love from CV21.
Tom, Max and the OIAOians.
*usually not the full bow but a section *the moon has to be at a certain altitude.