well guys, first attempt at the azores aborted.
we left wednesday morning at the crack of dawn
in north east wind that promised to switch to 
south and calm down a bit.  seas were big, not
sure how big but at least 10 feet.  big swells
and then disorganized waves on top of them that
were another 5 ft.  we needed to go northeast,
of course.  we were passed by many arc boats
(a race/rally group from england that sails
together and partys together for a fee) and
heard of boats who totally lost steering and
limped back into port with her emergency tiller.
after several hours of this we were only 20
miles from bermuda, wind was so strong we had
to be reefed and the wind was in the direction
we wanted to go, so we had to tack and boats
with reefed sails dont tack well and dont sail
close to the wind.  net result at the end of
a long hard day was we had made 20 miles progress.

then we noticed that the main sail had a split
in it.  a small one, right where it was reefed.
and we had 2000 miles to go and strong winds
coming for the next couple of days, so couldnt
take the sail down and sew it.  and, and, and.
so we turned back to bermuda, had to sail on
for a while so we didnt arrive back in the dark.
and of course now that we needed to sail south
the wind did switch around so going back it was
right into the wind too.  had to reef the main
sail more so the rip was protected and didnt
rip more.  total distance was about 70 miles
in 28 hours, net distance 0.

good news is that we got the sail fixed this
afternoon.  bad news is that its now almost
impossible for me to get to the azores in time
to fly back to teach my tutorials at usenix.
anyone or two of you want to sail from bermuda
to the azores in my place.

decisions, decisions.

hugs.

-evi