Author: Pete

Location: 23º 04.648N’ 85º 09.370W’

Date: 17:00 March 14 to 17:00 March 15

 

Day 6 at sea.

 

Good wind today. Last night after dinner we made popcorn and watched Finding Nemo, all gathered around a laptop. Occasionally someone would pop up to look for freighters, but we haven’t seen one in days.

We do have a passenger for the night. A booby bird made several passes at the boat before alighting on our port bow. He spent several hours preening while doing an impressive balancing act. I was trying to get another one interested so we could have a pair of them, but didn’t see any others way out here.

The night was easy, besides the shackle on the outhaul car which ripped free ten minutes into my graveyard shift. I had to tie the clue of the sail to the boom and take off the offending piece. Made it work until morning. Pulling the car off the boom track was fun in the dark on the rolling boat trying to catch plastic ball bearings as they rolled out of the car. The booby laughed at me I’m sure.

So today was project day! Not super flat, but still we managed. Put the car back on the boom track, which sounds like it should take 20 minutes. Broke 1 bolt, 1 tap screw, and drilled 6 holes through metal, all on a rolling boat. Took all day! But, what the heck else do we have to do?

Standing on.

Author: Pete

Location: 03º 18.939N’ 82º 45.492W’

Date: 17:00 March 13 to 17:00 March 14

 

Day 5 at sea.

 

Last night we got some wind in our sails at about 22:00, came up from 3 knots to 7 knots, enough to sail with. Miranda and Felix shut down the iron genoas and unfurled sails. We made 3 knots for a few hours. When I went on watch at 2:00 a line of clouds marked a weather shift. Sure enough as we went under the wind came up to 15 knots. I put a reef in the mainsail which balanced the boat and put us in a nice 6 knot cruise.

The price of wind is rougher seas. The wind hasn’t been strong for long enough to make any appreciable waves, but we have some chop making for a slightly annoying ride right now. In chop of a certain frequency and height the boat hobby horses until it’s bled off a knot or two, and then resumes its motion, an awkward dance that disrupts the normal flow of the boat. At least we’re moving, if not in style.

Liza spotted the reason for our lack of wind. There is supposed to be a low wind area as one passes through the ITCZ, a band of rising air. We finally got a surface condition weather fax that was a little more zoomed out to find that there are TWO ITCZs right now, one north of the Galapagos, and one south! Not a crazy phenomenon, but it means that we have a high pressure ridge (low wind) right where we want to sail. Nice sleuthing to our weather officer!

March 14^th is always a special day for us math-geek folks- PI DAY! Being that it’s 2015, it’s exact special. Instead of just celebrating the first three numbers of pi (3.14) on the date 3-14, we now get the added bonus of tacking on the next two numbers- 3.1415! Too choppy to bake a pie, so we had pie filling instead. Sailing is all about being resourceful, right?

We are progressing on our same course. It looks like we should have some wind for the next day or two, then have a day of motoring to get through a lull before getting back into some wind. But that’s 96 hours out, lots can change between now and then.

No boats last night. Only the odd albatross. Wonder what they’re doing all this way out here? They probably wonder the same about us! Still 467 miles from the Galapagos. At an optimistic 5 knots that’s 93 hours, or about 4 days, plus one or two more to make up for low wind and our arrival point not being the same spot as our projected harbor. But who’s counting? Anyone up for a round of ’99 Bottle of Beer on the Wall’?

Author: Pete

Location: 03º 51.412N’ 81º 36.720W’

Date: 17:00 March 12 to 17:00 March 13

 

Day 4 at sea.

 

Several hours of good wind yesterday. Okay, by good we mean ‘some’. Kept us cruising at 3 or 4 knots without motoring, a welcome quiet after 21 hours of becalmed air. Took turns jumping off of the bow of the boat, floating between the hulls and out the back where we had two long lines with floats attached to grab onto and pull ourselves back up the sugar scoops. Lots of fun. We always had two aboard in case we had to go pick someone up. The boat wasn’t moving fast, so it was fun to be repeatedly run over by Tayrona with nothing but 3000 feet of water under you.

Played Settlers of Catan while we bobbed along this afternoon and had a cold beer! What a treat!

Wind died again just as we reached Isla Malpelo.

Couldn’t stop at the flora and fauna sanctuary on the island. We are trying to outrun the Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ), a 60 mile wide snake of squalls and poor winds that runs roughly east-west and slides north and south like an elevator. It’s farther north and to avoid its adverse conditions we are trying to scoot on through to better weather while it is happily north of us.

Sir fry for dinner! Get the veggies while you can! Puppy chow for desert!

Stars are out in force and the moon has yet to rise. Calm seas.