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These newsletters are unique in that they were never actually received.  We sent them out, but our newsletter list-server was having "issues" with the Internet.  Only Ocelot in the Maldives was actually forwarded to our 200+ newsletter recipients.

Glorious sunset on a flat sea. Passage to Gan.

Our passage from Galle, Sri Lanka to Gan Island in Addu Atoll in the southern Maldives, was mostly on the wind -- one of our few windward passages -- but the conditions were relatively light and therefore quite pleasant, if slow.

The only real excitement was crossing the very busy shipping lanes just south of Sri Lanka.  All of the shipping between the Far East and the Mediterranean / Middle East goes past the bottom of Sri Lanka.  This is part of the marine "highway" that continues through the Straits of Malacca and around Singapore.  In these defined shipping lanes, we have essentially no right-of-way privileges, but the 3 ships we contacted by VHF radio were happy to alter course to avoid a "close encounter".

Our course was almost due southwest, and the winds were all from the west - stronger and a bit north of west to start, and then going light and moving more in front of us.  Ocelot sails fairly well at 40-45° off the wind but closer than that we usually motorsailed, rolling up the jib but leaving the main up as it continued to provide drive as close as 20° to the wind.

The following are our noon positions and statistics as we sailed from Galle, Sri Lanka, to Gan Island, Addu Atoll in the Southern Maldives.  Wind speeds and directions are apparent (from our perspective) not true:

Totals:  601 nautical miles in 5 days exactly, for an average speed of 5 knots.

The newsletters we sent while on passage are:

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