Author: Pete

Location: 17°33.639S’ 161°11.767W’

Date: July 23, 2015

Day 5 at sea.

Seas and wind continued to build into the night. We have a long-period swell coming in from the south. It’s hard for me to estimate or describe how big these ocean rollers are. It’s like an apartment building on its side rolling toward you at a jogging pace. You know those shots in action movies where the airplane crashes and is sliding towards the protagonist throwing sparks? Feels like that, but the sparks are white spray. They’re really tall, but widely spaced and the boat generally rides up and over them easily.

We also have a short-period wave train from all the wind coming from the southeast. These aren’t as tall as the big rollers, but are steep and frequent. They’re the ones breaking over our hull and washing the deck. The two of these major wave trains make for a confused sea that’s sloshing the boat around like a tennis shoe in a washing machine. The tennis shoe doesn’t seem to care, but the mice inside it are getting worked.

Did you ever see the movie Memphis Belle? As the swells sweep under the boat, depending on if we’re going up or coming down, they slap on the outside of the windward hull, or on the inside of the leeward hull and bridge deck. It makes a deep BOOM and shakes the boat. Makes me feel like I’m in a B-17 bomber flying through an anti-aircraft artillery barrage. BOOM!-shake. BOOM!-rattle. BOOM-BOOM!. To make it fun look through the port holes and fire at the swarms of imaginary fighter planes with my fifty-calibre baguettes. Ack-ack-ack-ack!

Can you tell that my iPod died? I ran out quickly to tie down a strap that came loose with my Ipod in my pocket and promptly got nailed by a boarding wave. Electronics and sea water don’t mix well, but that old girl doesn’t owe me a darn thing.

Things are hardest at dusk. You’re used to being able to see the waves and move with them. As twilight falls the sea and sky become the same color and you lose that ability. Eventually it gets dark enough that you forget about the monsters outside and just roll with it. The boat doesn’t care, why should you? We have about 1/4 of our main and 1/3 of our jib out. Still making 6-7 knots. The wind has been variable, but stays between 19 and 28 knots, with some gusts higher into the 30s. You can tell because the wind generator automatically shuts down for a few minutes after 30 knots. You know you’re having fun when your wind generator, a piece of equipment that by design needs lots of wind says, “Too much for me losers! Peace OUT!”

We have radar up and scanning for boats and looking at squall movement. We’re getting a good deal of sea return, where the radar sees waves and thinks they are ships. Fun, eh? Miranda is a heavy-seas rock star. I don’t think she notices that we’re bucking and heaving like crazy. It’s the literal sense of being even-keeled. Last night it was too dark to see the horizon, really disorienting; I staggered upstairs to relieve Miranda of the watch, clutching railings, cabinets, and sinks trying not to yak. She’s finishing a Level 5 Sudoku and munching snacks like it’s a lazy Sunday afternoon. Me, I keep up by popping Dramamine like crack-flavored Pez.

Grib weather files say we have another day of this circus before things settle down. We’ve changed our course a touch to the south to try to get to clearer weather sooner. We will pass Palmerson Atoll tomorrow morning. If things get worse we can stop there and wait for things to clear. Despite the sucky conditions spirits are high and the boat is shrugging off the onslaught of wind and wave.  Check the wind gauge on that one…

More from Tayrona soon.