Home straight

492 miles to go before Cheyenne enters history books

Day 56
Position at 0510GMT: 42deg 18.520 N 12 58.890W
Course/speed: 086deg/16.3 knots
TWS/TWA: 14.0knots/224 deg

In Plymouth the bunting and red carpet are being prepared for tomorrow's arrival of Steve Fossett and the crew of Cheyenne. At 0510GMT this morning the world's largest racing catamaran was some 492 miles from the finish line having ducked south of the great circle in an attempt to keep the wind.

Their passage over the course of today is likely to be a little slower than the 497 miles she made over day 56. The wind is currently 10 knots from the WSW but this afternoon they should sail into a little more pressure with the wind veering slightly and building as they head north. It is likely that they will finish on a high in perfect catamaran conditions 20 knots on a broad reach.

Even if she managed 450 miles this will still see her crossing the finish line off Ouessant at breakfast time tomorrow, before heading for her first landfall at Plymouth.


Brian Thompson reports from on board...

We sailed another night on our global voyage without incident, and so only one more night to go before we should finish. We are almost abeam of Cape Finisterre now, and so we have to cross the Bay of Biscay, and sail 480 miles, before we can call this mission completed. Winds are looking lightish, but our forecasters are confident we can finish sometime late Monday morning.

Even if delayed it should be daylight when we arrive in Ushant, which is great, as we will have spent 58 days at sea to return to this little rocky island, and to see it as we finally pass by, will make the finish all the more memorable.

Yesterday we had another great days sailing, and put almost 500 miles behind our transoms. The day started off a little squally but soon settled into sunshine and steady winds. These winds slowly went behind us, so by the afternoon we had set our big downwind sails. We kept the big gennaker up all night, and just at dawn we gybed on to port, heading north. It’s been nearly 10 days on starboard tack, since well before the equator, and not far north of Rio.

We will be finishing in the typical westerly winds of the North Atlantic for the last 12 hours. Most boats in the past have had to go around the Azores High, then spend the last several days in the westerlies, and consequently sailed a longer route. We have been very lucky, with a low pressure temporarily replacing the Azores High and letting us sail a more direct course up to the east of it. We still have to go through a transition area today, from the Southerlies we have been getting, to the Westerlies, and this will cause the light airs. Already the wind is down to 13 knots, and it should drop more until later in the afternoon, when it should then start to pick up again and increase close to 20 knots by the end of the night.

All is good on board; all the various repairs we have made, seem to be holding in there, touchwood. Dave's eye is much better, he can go on deck without his Terminator style, single lens sunglasses, and his vision in the eye is rapidly getting back to normal. Nick's scar is healing up much better than you would expect if you first saw the cut, and I am standing in for his mother, making sure he puts sun block on it every day.

We saw several turtles swimming their way around the Atlantic yesterday. They were about a meter long, and light brown in colour. They did not have time to do their usual duck dive down, before we had flashed past them.

Also saw dolphins twice, they were leaping above the waves to get a glimpse of us, as we dived for our cameras or just enjoyed the show.