Daily Update 26.12.2025
Time – 0900 (UTC)
Ship Time – 0800 (-1)
Date – 26.12.2025
Position – 06 29 54’ N 053 49 36’ W
Average Speed Last 24 Hours – 5 kts
Distance Last 24 Hours – 121 nm
Total Distance this voyage – 1970 nm
Total distance to destination – 94.7 nm
Temperature – 26 degrees celsius
Sea State – 1
Wind (Beaufort) – 2
Status – Sailing
Log keeper – Claire Cuddihy
Yesterday was a busy day filled with laughter and a whole lot of love. 2 of us floaties, Grace and Myself, started the day bright and early at 0600 to continue making cookies for everyone to share during our gift exchange; but by around 0900 other people were up and the day started as normal, kind of. Instead of our usual breakfast we had brunch from 0900 to 1100 where pancakes, scrambled eggs, and bacon were all served along with the usual brekkie items. It seemed our fishers were given a unique present this Christmas as one of our lines picked up a 70 inch sailfish. At 1130 we had secret Santa which definitely showed our year’s funny side, but was of course generally enjoyed by all. Straight after that was over we brought out the cookies, which covered 5 trays and took 4 days to make. Of course you may be wondering how many cookies that actually is so allow me to break it down for you. Over 4 days we made…
320 Chocolate Chip Cookies
175 Double Chocolate Cookies
72 Peanut butter balls
64 Sugar Cookies
112 Brownies
68 Brown Sugar oatmeal cookies
And 82 meringue bites
Totalling 893 baked treats, + a few that ‘broke’
At 1300 it was the event that everyone had been waiting for, the Watch Olympics.
The Olympics involved 10 events, well 9 events and a skit really. For the past weeks all watches had been preparing so tensions were running high. It ended with watch one winning but let’s look at how that happened. The first event was the quickest and neatest harbour furl, the time is the overall winner but the neatness is per bracket. In the end watch five took out the fastest time even with a five second penalty, our time was 1 minute 38 seconds, plus 5 seconds so 1.43 mins; watches 1, 4, and 5 took out neatness in their brackets. Next event was the quickest time setting the vorstengestagsegel with one of the watch members acting as the toppsi, in the end it was a close race with the top 2 times within 2 seconds of each other, despite watch 5 snapping at their heels it was watch 4 that was the fastest with a time of 56 seconds. The last team event was the clar deck, which ended with watch 3 landing on top even with penalties they had a time of 2.00 minutes flat. So far it had been a pretty close competition but it soon became obvious that the individual events would set the game truly in motion. The first challenge being the longest time helming within 2 degrees of the set course. With a remarkable time of 4 minutes and 3 seconds Angelo from watch five took out the first individual event. The next win went to Grace from watch 4 who completed the set knot list the fastest while blindfolded. What came next was the metaphorical sprints of our Olympics, the fastest belay of the mooring lines; using a knockout style of round watch 5 took out this event and Max, their champion, also took out a job offer after a clear win and mind blowing time of 7.3 seconds. Next was the eye splice and of course this was the quickest time to full completion. In this event we needed a tie breaker as Dawson (Watch 2) and Mariandre (Watch 4) both completed their splice in 1 minute 35 seconds. After mistakes from both competitors in their showdown Dawson seemed to recover quicker and took out this event for his watch. Down to the final two events tensions were running high and the last two events were highly watched. First was Fizz quiz, a game where participants blindly draw pin names from a hat, or yogurt tub, and stand anywhere on deck. When the adjudicator calls, everyone unfolds their paper and races to get to their pin, points are only given if the first person gets the correct pin. After a few redos the games ended with points tallies as such: Jacob (Watch 3) 2 points, Claire (Watch 5) 2 points, and the winner Mau (Watch 1) getting a grand 6 points. That left one event before the skit, the survival suit donning race. In a time trial fashion watch 5 led by Emeric landed on top with a time of 32 seconds, let’s just say he’s not dying anytime soon. So that concluded all the seamanship events and the point tallies were as follows.
1st Place – Watch 5, 23 points
2nd Place – Watch 4, 22 points
3rd Place – Watch 3, 16 points
4th Place – Watch 1, 12 points
5th Place – Watch 2, 8 points
6th Place – Watch 6, 0 +1 pity points
For the skit teams had the chance to wager points and of course every team went all in, double of nothing. Which yes meant that nothing before the skit mattered. Despite Watch 4s beautiful rendition of one of the scenes from Mean Girls, thanks to the guys from their watch, Watch 1 one the skit and thus took the Irving Johnson Memorial Games Watch Olympics. A massive congratulations to Luca, Alex, Nyla, Isabelle, and Faya. And an extra big congratulations to Mau whose watch not only won but he was crowned the Altlantic Crossing Irving Johnson, someone who is knowledgeable, kind, and truly represents the spirit of the sailor.
Thus with the Olympics over and night beginning to fall the Alex got quieter and quieter as one by one we all turned and went to bed. For their/our clear display of superior seamanship watch 5 were graciously allowed to be the first watch to resume watch at 1800 and of course, it was raining.
