The last 24 hours have been a series of contrasts. Midday we were keeping watch forward when we noticed the Windex on our forward mast start to spin. Very strange, indeed, as we had a steady 15 to 20 knots of breeze on the starboard beam.

Looking away we then noticed an unfamiliar shape on the horizon. Putting the glasses on this spec revealed something from another era – a full rigged ship! We then did a speed and heading check with the radar and found the vessel was not using its engine (if it even had one) and was moving along at 5 knots. As we’d recently watched a movie about time warps and were going to be crossing the Bermuda triangle a month from now we really started to wonder. Should we close with this apparition from another era, or put distance between us? Curiosity eventually won out.

And we’re glad it did. Watching the Spanish Navy sail training vessel, Delcano, reach along was worth the trip down from California. This is no tall ships parade, with engines running. Its the real thing, 150 miles from the nearest land.

We also shot some video which we’ll post one of these days.

A little later in the day we were really pleased to have the use of the Furuno 2117 commercial grade radar. There was a north bound ship to our starboard and a Panama bound ship to port, with a separation of three miles between them. Sounds like a lot, but when you see a pair of huge ships bearing down on you from two directions it makes for heart palpitations.

The good news is that they and we all have AIS transponders, and so there is an accurate rendition of each vessel’s speed, heading, and closest point of approach. That’s the Panama bound ship above.

We used the ARPA intercept function of the radar to make sure we stayed exactly in the middle! The ship on the northwesterly heading is above.

You don’t hear much outside noise when the doors and hatches are closed. But the clatter of the rotors on this chopper were unmistakable this morning. They hung off our port quarter, then stern, then starboard. They were probably snapping photos just as we were.

Weather remains true to the models. We have light airs and smooth seas. Another day and we’ll be digging out the fenders and dock lines and getting ready for the Panama Canal.