Well I can honestly say that I am now starting to get really frustrated with all these light winds.  It wasn’t too bad before because at least it was from a stable direction and even though the boat was traveling slowly the B and G Auto Pilot was still able to keep up.  Now however it is a different beast all together. 

Last night ended up being a very long night with almost no sleep.  There weren't any hazards around like shipping or land but the winds just didn’t want to play nice.  I have so far been sailing with the code zero sail up on the foredeck which is great for the lighter winds as it is such a large sail however you cant sail close hauled with this sail as it has too deep a cut to it to catch the winds correctly. 

Well its been another slow 24 hours however last night for a few short hours I was able to make some decent ground with a nice 15 knot breeze blowing from the NE to ENE.  I still have the Code Zero sail up,  this is my largest light air sail and I really feel that it has been making a difference even in the really light winds and last night with 15 knots true wind and 11 knots apparent winds I was able to actually sail at 7-9 knots of boat speed. 

Well, I am sad to report that I have managed to travel 50nm in the last 24 hours... This is not really that fast but likely faster than what the next 24 hours has in store... Last night the winds were holding at 10 knots from the ENE and I was able to coast along at 4-5 knots.

Last night was a fairly easy night with steady winds of 20 knots blowing in from the east.  I ended up sailing a slight North West course yesterday to try to stay in the winds as long as possible.  Throughout the night my sleep was interrupted by 2 vessels that only showed up on the radar when they were within 2 nm of me.  The weird thing was that they appeared to be fishing boats or maybe even a small cruise liner as they had so many lights on them but I was unable to find any navigation lights.  It struck me as a bit odd so I decided to remain on deck until I was well clear.

Well it has been a little bit of a slow day for me today after staying awake until past 2am last night until I had cleared the last of the Torris Straight.  The winds were holding at 20 knots last night and there was a sharp swell following along behind.  I was quite relieved to have finished by passage and be heading back out to open waters and I was so looking forward to some sleep.  

So last night I was making my approaches to the Pandora Passage which is the main shipping entry at the very top of the Great Barrier Reef.  I arrived an hour after sunset with 30-35 knots of wind and 3-4 meter swell.  On the entry there is a 10nm gap between the 2 outer reefs and then almost 200nm of passages that I needed to follow through all the inner islands and around all the reefs and rocks.

Well last night the winds maintained 30 knots and the swell continued to build so that now I am sailing in 5 meter swell.  It was also a rather sad night for me as I had a new visitor to the boat.  At about 11 pm there was a thwak on the deck of the boat so I went on deck to take a look and found a lovely little brown sea bird cradling its damaged wing hunched on the back deck.  It was about the size of a large pigeon with a lovely long slender beak.  It didnt take a genius to figure out that it had hit the - becoming now infamous - wind generator.

Last night was fairly uneventful as I was in open waters and managed have consistent winds throughout the evening.  The swell has picked up a bit so it was quite rolley through the night making sleep a little difficult and at sunrise I woke to find that shark reef was 20nm almost dead ahead.  I altered course 20 degrees to port and then carried on.  So for most of today I have been sailing along the edge of a reef system and am just clearing the last reef now.