Author: Pete

Location: 06º 4.714N’ 80º 08.573W’

Date: 17:00 March 10 to 17:00 March 11

Day 2 at sea.

Well it’s our second full day aboard in passage to Galapagos. Yesterday brought low winds and we hoisted the purple, pink, and blue spinnaker. It’s nice to have something colorful out in all this blue and white. We made 5 knots in 7 knots of wind. Pretty good, and beat sailing wing-wing in low wind with the headsail flapping.

Some stronger winds last night made for a faster ride. Waves hadn’t had time to build, so we went lickedy-split!

Yesterday we heard blowing sounds off our starboard and saw whales spouting about a 500 meters away. Also big dolphins came to investigate us. Dolphins seem larger and slightly less interested in us than their Caribbean counterparts.

Made 96 miles and are averaging 5 knots. Calm, comfortable sailing. Finally made it out of the big bay of Panama City. Now we’re into blue water, though we’re still seeing tree trunks floating by occasionally.

Boat traffic has decreased. Last night we only saw one. This morning we had two stowaways, squid landed on the deck! We will fish with them today!

Took advantage of the flat seas to trim up my wild-sailor mane.

All is good aboard Tayrona. Working on a set of Baggywrinkles for chafe protection on the spreaders. The mainsail touches when we are going downwind and we don’t want it to rub holes in the fabric.

Baggywrinkles are made by pulling apart an old rope into strands, then tying them into two 8′ fishing lines with a lark’s head knot. Makes a shaggy line that looks like a dirty Pomeranian hung out to dry. Then you wind it around the spreaders, something I’ll have to do when we get into port.

More later from the deck of the Tayrona!