Pete Goss and his crew on the replica Mounts Bay luggerSpirit of Mysteryare celebrating one month at sea as they approach the equator. They are part-way through a 12,000 mile voyage to Australia, following in the footsteps of seven Cornishmen, who made the same voyage in 1854.

After floundering in the doldrums for days, the boat is beginning to pick up speed. In his blog, Goss writes: “It is always hard to be sure but my feeling is that it is also the day that we put the Doldrums behind us as we have had a steady gradient wind build throughout the day, and the clouds have just been clouds without the terrible two’s of the past week. The boat has dried out and it has been a joy to sit on deck with a delightfully blue sea and a steady speed.”

They are a few hundred miles ahead of the leaders in the Vendée Globe. Pete famously finished fifth in the 1996 race after turning back to rescue fellow competitor Raphael Dinelli in the Southern Ocean.

Keep up with the lugger’s progress as she heads south.