Unbeknown to us, not only was Milton upgraded to a Category 5 hurricane, but it dipped further South than forecast - towards us. Which meant that not only had we been sailing in a hurricane, but yesterday we had been sailing towards the worst of it for a solid 12 hours. Our sailing friends became concerned by our lack of progress. Various theories had been brewing. Have we lost our electronics in a lightning strike? Are were adrift on the tide?

An especially large wave breaks over the bow and the spray, airborne, flies back towards the helm. My instincts are to close my eyes and turn away. As I reopen my eyes, it’s 30 knots, 31 knots, 32 knots… and I can see a squall on the horizon. The rain is now pelting down so hard that it hurts my skin. For how many days will this go on? Surely, it must subside at some point?

Then, all of a sudden, the squall is upon us. The wind speed jumps up to 35 knots. We are still on the J1 with two reefs in the main. And we are rather overpowered. We hold on tight, waiting to reach the the centre of the squall and accompanying lull, so we can get the Staysail out in anticipation of seeing another 35 knots on our way out. The sea state is confused and the wind angles are dancing around, but then Charles spots a smidge of blue sky amongst the grey. We decide to tack towards the blue, trying to avoid being dragged East by the squall.

I go forward to the shrouds to unclip the running backstay. Not a second after my foot steps back into the cockpit, the next 35 knots hits.

Out of nowhere, we get 30 knots. We start heeling, I shout for main sheet off, Ben starts to dump it, but a gust causes us to round up. The helm is heavy and I am desperately trying to bring us back down. But I go too far, and now we really are overpowered. As we prepare to tack, I hand over the helm to Charles. We round up again. We lose steering.

There’s a squall coming. A big one. I wake Ben to get the Code Zero furled. Click, click, click, click, click goes the fishing line. Of course, after 36 hours of having the fishing gear out, now we get our first bite. We prioritise furling the zero, then try to reel the fish in. It’s a big one, heavy. Halfway reeled in, we lose the fish. So there’s still no fish braai on the cards. The squall is close now. We finish dropping and lashing down the Code Zero as the heavens open.

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.

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!