Beveridge Reef

Sunday 1900 local time (we may have crossed into another time zone but haven't checked yet).
S20 40 W163 02

Confetti is 200nm west of Rarotonga. That's right, west! We had planned to go north to Suwarrow Island, but the wind was on the nose, and forecast was to remain that way: NW 15-20 knots. So we said, "Let's go west instead!"

We are currently en route on a course of 280-degrees true to an uninhabited atoll called, "Beveridge Reef." It is about 125 miles east of the island, Niue, where we intend to afterward go. We may still head north to Suwarrow, after Niue, before going to American Samoa. But we will see what the wind dished out for us.

The last 20 hours of sailing have been absolutely delightful, close-reaching and beam-reaching in 15-20 knots today, moving along at an easy 8-knots. In fact the sailing has been the easiest and most lovely sailing of our whole trip. Knock on wood, but with no pressing repairs or big projects I actually sat on deck and read for hours today - a first in a while. It was particularly nice because the air is cooler at this latitude, and the sky has been completely cloud-covered. Not great for the solar
panels, but really welcome relief on the skin. Riina also enjoyed a good book, and Matt and Dan did what I suspect they've been doing for much of their 20+year friendship, and talked, chatted, discussed, ranted! It was a great day and Matt is now harnessed into the galley (since we are on starboard tack, heeling away from the stove) cooking us up a good meal.

We had the fishing gear out earlier, but the only interested party was a Tropic bird that kept dive-bombing our lure. Every time it did we all screamed as loud as we could at it, since fried Tropic bird doesn't sound that appealing.

If the wind holds, we should be approaching Beveridge reef (S20 00 W167 46) by Tuesday morning. All well aboard S/V Confetti on a dark, cloudy, but wonderful night!