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Sunday, August 2, 2009

Now In European Waters! ! ! Moving Forward At 4 MPH With “Only” 100 Miles To Go!

Ralph via Sat phone (transcribed)
Hi this is Ralph. We have just crossed over the 100 mile mark from Greenland. We are clearly in Greenland waters, which make it European waters! This means that we have crossed the ocean at this point in time! It’s still a long way to go to get there, a100 miles to Greenland.
We are using the 9.9 horsepower motor rather than our big motor because it gives us better fuel economy. We got off into seas that had bigger waves than the weather report said they were. We were going head on into some pretty good size seas and into strong winds and strong currents; consequently we just didn’t go anywhere. We put out our sea anchors and waited for better weather to come on in. Now with better weather we are coming on in. I guess that’s what we have been saying all along. It is seamanship that keeps us alive and keep things moving. I got to admit I was wondering if we were ever going to get better weather to come on in. God has now given us wind out of the North, even though I was praying for wind out of the Northwest; however wind out of North is better than out of East.
We are using our 9.9 horse power engine. It burns about three quarters of a gallon per hour and we are moving at 4 knots. When we started this process we had 60 gallons on board. That was enough to go for 100 hours at 4 knots or 400 miles. We don’t want to go that far at 4 knots per hour, we have around 100 miles to go and should be there tomorrow afternoon in Greenland, Lord willing and everything else going well.
We are grateful for everybody following us. All is well, we are very grateful for Cape Surf that provided us with a board blanket that makes a great windshield and a water breaker. It is also a water resistant sleeping bag, a really a good deal.
We are grateful for all the different people working so hard on our project. We are grateful for Bernie, Trey, Bruce, Renee, John, J.C., my wife Anne, Bob’s wife Jill, and all of those helping our cause. We are grateful for the kids putting up with us being gone so long. One of the things that keeps going through my mind is what are my kids doing? Now that we are 100 of miles from shore we are moving onward and forward to meet our goal.
Thank you so much for paying attention to us. Thank you to everyone involved. Thank you to Norm Miller and Interstate Batteries.

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