Sarah Pedersen 28th June 2023
After two days without seeing land, we can now see the island of fog, Bear Island. We are now at 74 degrees north and the temperature has dropped a lot since we left the Norwegian coast. It is now just below 10 degrees and we have to sit close to keep warm and bring up blankets and turn on the heat below.
It is hard to sail constantly even with the autopilot: the sleep is very irregular and in turns at the cockpit, so we have been outside for 3 days now. The irregular sleep map gives you a very groggy feeling and while on watch you suddenly feel your head dropping. You just feel constantly tired and wonder ‘why do you do this’ when you could catch a direct flight to Svalbard and jump on a cruise with heat and a buffet.
But then you hear a weird breathing sound outside the boat and you see a huge whale (we think a Fin or Minke whale because of the white stomach) swim along it or notice a large pack of white-beaked dolphins jump with a Fin Whale. It is just fantastic to experience.
The seagulls continue to bring out scary sides as we sailed by lonely gull feasting on its dead friend.
Our grogginess has resulted in some strange eating habits consisting of very little as neither of us has an idea of what we want to have. Because we sleep in turns and have no idea of night or day, we just added more confusion to our already daylight confused bodies.
But tomorrow we will have overnight oats and rhubarb/apple compote as Sarah is adjusting to the sea and got herself together.
We will anchor on the south east side of Bear Island an hope the forecast of no wind tomorrow will come true.