For the past two weeks we’ve been seeing strong trades right through Panama. Here we are on Friday morning, about to head out, the last 400 miles are showing light and variable – maybe even light headwinds!

We’ve checked the AVN model against the Oceanic Experimental model using the MaxSea chopper and, sad to say, they both agree with the NMG NOAA forecasts. Normally we’d hang out and wait for a better sailing conditions. But this time of year every day counts against the start of the hurricane season off Central America. Hopefully the professionals and the models will all be wrong. If not, we’ll burn some diesel.