We are off! Next stop: Belize. We are hugging the Florida coastline to keep out of the Gulf Stream, before cutting across it and hugging the Cuban coastline, then making a beeline for Belize. The passage should take us around 5 days. It feels so good to be back on the water. As we motored through the Palm Beach Inlet, taking us from the Intracoastal waterway out into the Atlantic, we popped open a bottle to celebrate. I cannot express just how draining the last few weeks have been. Each and every day, it felt like we had a never ending to do list which evolved into a comedy of errors. Nothing was as straightforward as it should have been and everything took ten times as long as we expected. Go to sleep, wake up, put Argonaut back together, repeat. A boat work edition of Groundhog Day. How we all felt was rather neatly summed up by Ben. Ben: “I hate boats.” Although we are all tired, that stress now feels like a world away. Less than hour in to our passage, we were serenaded by a pod of dolphins. If that’s not a good luck charm, I don’t know what is! As night fell, we got into the rhythm of our watches. 3 hours on during the night, 6 hours off, 2 hours on during the day, 4 hours off. Keeping watch solo. I struggled to keep my eyes open on my 21.00-00.00 watch, then struggled to sleep with the noise and heat thereafter. But now, my body has started to adjust to the rhythm, and the stress of the last few months is beginning to fade. At sunrise, we were greeted with the view of a rainbow over Miami. By lunchtime, the colours are more vivid, and we are surrounded by the most surreal shade of turquoise blue waters. Ben’s new dive watch informed him that it is now a good time to fish, so the lure is out, and we have our fingers crossed for a fish braai tonight! Continued on www.alexandrabevis.com

It turns out you are not allowed to anchor inside the reef at Banco Chinchorro, as we found out when we were swiftly moved on by the Mexican navy. But we weren’t going to let the crystal clear waters of this gem slip by without a dive! Back onboard, we set off for Belize and lit the braai. Time to eat Ben’s catch from midnight! Paired with buttery baby potatoes. We all breathed a collective sigh of relief as the wind became strong enough to turn the engine off and simply sail. Plus, we were going faster than before! Overnight, the wind died, and we had to motor again. By morning, the water is glassy, with any sign of wind a distant memory. We turn the engine off to refill the oil, and took the opportunity to cool off with a swim. There was another iconic weather update from Ben: “There’s no wind.” As we get ready to motor the final few hours to Belize City, the engine won’t start. Cue much tinkering from Charles and Sam. But it won’t do. So Argonaut becomes dinghy powered. At first we try an in line tow, but that is rather stressful and doesn’t get us very far. Then we try a side by side tow. Much more success! With the dinghy’s engine, we are almost up to the same speeds as with our main engine! Ben highlights that the past three counties we’ve arrived in, we’ve arrived without an engine. It seems getting towed in Argonaut’s signature move. Come nightfall, it is time to anchor.

As the day draws to a close, we pull up the anchor and set off on an overnight sail to Banco Chinchorro, the second largest atoll on the planet, where we are hoping to spend some time snorkelling and scuba diving. As we motored into the sunset (no wind), Ben launches the drone to capture the candyfloss sky. Sadly, this will transpire to be its final flight. It’s the third drone to be lost off Argonaut this year. Come 2100, it’s my watch. The stars are bright, and the moon is getting bigger every night. Disconcertingly, the B&G chart plotter says we are going over land. Yet, according to Navionics, we have 100+ metres of water. We think Navionics is right, I can’t relax into what should be a fairly straightforward watch, just motoring. Then, the depth gauge starts decreasing below my comfort zone. It doesn’t match what the chart says even on Navionics, and B&G has us approaching another blob of land. I consult Ben, who is still milling around after his watch. We start turning to port, away from the danger. But then, the engine revs started faltering unexpectedly. And then the engine cuts out altogether. Here we go again. Jib out. Charles and Sam are in the engine room problem solving. On deck, we notice the hilariously fast increase in current: 1.6 knots, the next time I look 2.2 knots, then 2.3. We are now heading due East, away from land, we are now starting to move into the Gulf Stream, which for us is adverse current (we want to head South, the current runs North). After some foreplay, Charles gets the engine running again. It turns out that the engine panel switch was knocked, starving the engine of fuel, causing it to cut out. It’s in a really easy place to knock, so changing the switch is being added to our never-ending snagging list. We were noisily on the move again. Just as everyone had settled into sleep: click, click, click, click, click goes the fishing rod. It keeps going like mad. I wake Ben. He starts to reel it in. It’s a big one. I slow down to help him. Of course, Charles and Sam wake up to the change in pitch and are suddently up and about, worried something is wrong. After a team effort to reel it in and filleting it, a plan was hatched - to pair it with buttery new potatoes for dinner the following night. By the time the fish fillets were in the fridge, it was midnight, and time to hand over the watch to Charles - no rest for the skipper, yet again! I awake abruptly to the sound of the revs changing up and down on the engine a few times. I crawl out of bed and find Ben in the engine room, refilling the day tank. “Go look on the transom” he says. Sleepily, I make my way up on deck. On the transom, there is a huge barracuda. Ben: I caught a fish! He is beaming! I don’t think I’ve ever seen him so happy, he is smiling with his eyes. We are nearly there, so I snooze on deck. We anchor, switch off the engine, and at last there is some peace. We promptly fall into the water. The visibility is insanely clear. It’s going to be a good day.

What an incredible day on the water, weaving through mangroves, landing on an uninhabited island, and making friends with a hermit crab. It felt like we were truly explorers! We were even chaperoned back to Argonaut by a pod of dolphins!

After a few weeks of rest and repairing following some weaknesses identified whilst sailing through Hurricane Milton, we are moving again! It feels good. Where to next? Belize, but perhaps via Cozumel and/or some atolls to go scuba diving along the way. We started on the jib and the main with one reef. We discussed flying the Code Zero, but as Charles put it: “But don’t want to sail too quickly, we don’t want to arrive in the dark”. Cruiser mentality has certainly set in! It was very rolly for the first few hours, and rather unpleasant sailing. By my midnight watch, we had reached the channel between mainland Mexico and Cozumel. It was lovely to be back on the water, sailing under a waxing moon. By daylight, we reached the South tip of Cozumel. We quickly ascertained that the mooring buoys were rather shallow and we were told we could only stay for 4 hours, so we decided to continue South to one of the bays of the mainland in which we could anchor. We popped up the spinnaker and we were moving! But come my 1100 watch, the wind was starting to die. It became trickier and tricker to helm, and then the wind speed was so low that it made more sense to drop and motor on. So we did. A nice clean drop. On our way toward Punta Allen, we were greeted by a dolphin parade the likes of which I’ve never seen before! So many dolphins, everywhere, all at once. I stood on the bow for a good half hour, watching them play. It was all rather surreal. Ben catches a fish, but once in it becomes clear another fish enjoyed it for dinner instead. Thankfully, at sunset, Ben caught another fish, which remained whole. The braai has been lit, and we are now anchoring. Looking forward to enjoying our surf and turf!

Charles has lit the braai! It’s giving first night of the Caribbean 600 vibes, braaiing downwind. We should be on the spinnaker, but we haven’t finished rigging it and quite frankly we’re still too tired to sort it out if something goes wrong. So for now, we’re rigging a stabiliser for the main and poling out the jib, running goose winged. We are still trying to hug the coast to keep out of the Gulf Stream, which is running against us, but the wind is not working in our favour. So we are currently a bit further offshore and in more adverse current. It feels slow. As the sun sets, we do a rig check. A few bolts on the main sheet had become loose, so we tightened those. Then we turn to dinner. Sadly, Ben didn’t catch any fish today, so our evening menu consists of sausages with a side of sweet potatoes. Our fridge is filled to the brim with meat and cheese, with only limited space for fresh vegetables. We will no doubt need to crack open the tins at some point, but for now we are running with “boy dinner” (meat, potatoes). Tonight is much darker, no longer having the light pollution from the skyscrapers of Miami. With no clouds, the stars shine bright. And in the distance, hundreds of miles away, a lightning storm is putting on quite the show. But don’t go thinking it’s all sunshine and roses. We are rolling a lot. And it is near impossible to sleep in the hotbox that is our cabin. I had to splash myself with water and lie in the cockpit for a while to cool down in the sea breeze. That half an hour snooze was the best sleep I’ve had so far this passage. Come 03.00 I’m back on watch. There is now bioluminescence in our wake, as if we are trailing glitter. But we can’t relax entirely. We need to keep our speed up. There is an area of low pressure in the Gulf of Mexico developing into a storm, which is forecast to roll our way. So we have set ourselves a speed cutoff: anything less than 3.5 knots of boat speed, and we will turn the engine on. None of us are particularly keen to do that, but we need to ensure we get South and out of its path as quickly as possible. When it’s time to get my head down, I don’t repeat my mistake of sleeping in our cabin. I build myself a pillow fortress in the saloon, and there I sleep soundly for two hours. I awake to the sound of fishing lures being assembled. As I stretch myself awake, there’s a cry on deck: dolphins! Still half asleep, I clamber up and to the bow. What a way to start the day! We are reaching. Ben had been asking to hoist the new Code Zero for the best part of 36 hours non-stop. But now we start talking about hoisting, it appears that our bowman has adjusted a little more quickly to Caribbean time than any of us could have hoped for. Ben: Ugh, I’m going to have to go forward now, aren’t I? Life is so tough. After a rather strong coffee, we hoist and unfurl the new Code Zero without a hitch. She’s a monster. A beautiful, beautiful, monster. Immediate speed. We turn South, heading for Cuba. The new Code Zero has been named. “Passage Making”. I like it. It’s true in both senses: it’s made our passage, and we are moving! SOG 8.1 knots COG 205 TWS 12.8 knots TWD 134 TWA 70 Sails: Main, NEW Code Zero (maiden sail) 4 Oct 1700 - 5 Oct 1200 Key Largo, Florida - Key West, Florida

We are off! Next stop: Belize. We are hugging the Florida coastline to keep out of the Gulf Stream, before cutting across it and hugging the Cuban coastline, then making a beeline for Belize. The passage should take us around 5 days. It feels so good to be back on the water. As we motored through the Palm Beach Inlet, taking us from the Intracoastal waterway out into the Atlantic, we popped open a bottle to celebrate. I cannot express just how draining the last few weeks have been. Each and every day, it felt like we had a never ending to do list which evolved into a comedy of errors. Nothing was as straightforward as it should have been and everything took ten times as long as we expected. Go to sleep, wake up, put Argonaut back together, repeat. A boat work edition of Groundhog Day. How we all felt was rather neatly summed up by Ben. Ben: “I hate boats.” Although we are all tired, that stress now feels like a world away. Less than hour in to our passage, we were serenaded by a pod of dolphins. If that’s not a good luck charm, I don’t know what is! As night fell, we got into the rhythm of our watches. 3 hours on during the night, 6 hours off, 2 hours on during the day, 4 hours off. Keeping watch solo. I struggled to keep my eyes open on my 21.00-00.00 watch, then struggled to sleep with the noise and heat thereafter. But now, my body has started to adjust to the rhythm, and the stress of the last few months is beginning to fade. At sunrise, we were greeted with the view of a rainbow over Miami. By lunchtime, the colours are more vivid, and we are surrounded by the most surreal shade of turquoise blue waters. Ben’s new dive watch informed him that it is now a good time to fish, so the lure is out, and we have our fingers crossed for a fish braai tonight! SOG: 6.0 knots TWS: 8.8 knots TWD: 71 TWA: 99 AWA: 62 Sails: Main, J1 (we are hoping to assemble the new Code Zero shortly!) 3 Oct 1700 - 4 Oct 1700 Riviera Beach, Florida - Key Largo, Florida