Author: cruisingrunner

April 1, 2014

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Logbook – April 1, 2014 (Punta de Mita to Hiva Oa)

Passage Log Highlights

• 1209 main + genoa
• 1706 D–>B main + genniker
• 2307 T–>D main + genoa
• Min TWS 14 kts E
• Max TWS 19.4 kts E

Daily Notes

• Day 22

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No photos

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Email to family and friends dated April 1, 2014

Subject: Day 22

We’ve had steady SE trade winds for 2 days now, making our last days at sea quite a sleigh ride.  We should make landfall by sunrise, and I told everyone I would be waking them up.  You know how when you don’t like something but you know you are going to have to endure it for awhile you can do all sorts of subconscious mental gymnastics to not even acknowledge it.  Like if you don’t actually think it it’s not actually bothering you?  Well, I fell off the balance beam today, figuratively and somewhat literally.  Today, for the first day, I absolutely could not tolerate any longer not being able to stand or move about or do pretty much anything without holding on! 

It was a good school day, because you don’t usually have to hold on to sit down, but you do have to keep your core muscles engaged at all times.  Brenden finished his second test lesson today, which means he’s 1/4 of the way done with 5th grade.

I made homemade mac and cheese today (with bread crumbs on top and everything) and it was a huge hit.  Boxed mac and cheese is one of the few packaged food items I have not relented and used on board.  Oh, that and boxed mashed potatoes.  So, it had been over a year since we’ve had mac and cheese.  It was a huge hit, but kind of a pain to make, since it didn’t follow my usual rule of dirtying only one dish (it used a pot and a casserole dish).  The boys, who do the dishes, didn’t actually mind, though.

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At 4/2/2014 6:30 AM (utc) our position was 09°02.56’S 137°49.21’W

March 31, 2014

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Logbook – March 31, 2014 (Punta de Mita to Hiva Oa)

Passage Log Highlights

• 0632 main + genniker
• 2319 main + genoa
• Min TWS 10.1 kts E
• Max TWS 14.2 kts E

Daily Notes

• Day 21
• B – test lesson 40
• Awesome pork tenderloin dinner w/ coffee tequila night cap
• Squalls

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No photos

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Email to family and friends dated March 31, 2014

Subject: PPJ Day 21 – Week 3

Nothing much to report other than we are under 2 days away and flying along at 8 kts right now.  I’m up for my 11pm watch, and I barely slept a wink, mostly due to waves crashing into the hull jolting me wide awake.  We had the most awesome pork tenderloin dinner, if I do say so myself.  I don’t know if it really was the best tenderloin I’ve ever prepared or if it had just been so long we forgot how wonderful it was, but wow, did we enjoy it.  So much so that it called for an after dinner drink, and we lifted our alcohol ban to enjoy small glasses of the coffee flavored tequila I bought when we went tequila tasting in Puerto Vallarta.  We are dodging squalls tonight and getting a little bit of rain, so it’s nice for Exodus to get a bit of a shower before we arrive.  Tomorrow we will tidy up and make final preps for a (hopefully) Wednesday arrival.

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At 4/1/2014 6:28 AM (utc) our position was 07°16.44’S 135°34.70’W

March 30, 2014

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Logbook – March 30, 2014 (Punta de Mita to Hiva Oa)

Passage Log Highlights

• 1200 D–>T main + genoa
• Min TWS 10.3 kts E
• Max TWS 14.9 kts NE

Daily Notes

• Day 20

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No photos

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Email to family and friends dated March 30, 2014

Subject: PPJ Day 20

Distance to waypoint = 356 nmi.  We should arrive Wed afternoon or Thurs morning.  I am looking forward to exploring the town.  French bread and pastries… mmmmm

I did a tally of our engine usage, and it hasn’t been all that bad.  We’ve run one engine on four occasions totaling 11 hours, 34 minutes.  Our approach has been that we run one engine when both of the following two conditions occur: 1) Light winds, such that we would be traveling < 3.5 kts, mas o menos, over ground.  2) It’s time to charge the batteries and we would need to run the generator anyway.  If you’ve got to burn fossil fuel, might as well burn the one that will also propel you forward.

Yesterday’s GRIB files showed that we should see 10-15 kts of wind the rest of the way, so if that holds up, we won’t need to run the engines anymore.  Of course, right now it’s blowing about 8 kts.   We had a strange wind shift in the afternoon to the ENE, that certainly wasn’t in the GRIBs, so you just really never know what you’re going to get.

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At 3/31/2014 12:31 PM (utc) our position was 06°03.73’S 134°03.15’W

March 29, 2014

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Logbook – March 29, 2014 (Punta de Mita to Hiva Oa)

Passage Log Highlights

• 0510 SB engine on 1600 rpm
• 0752 SB engine off
• 0910 genniker only
• Min TWS 4.7 kts E
• Max TWS 11.2 kts E

Daily Notes

• Day 19
• No school – baked bread and cookies
• Alex & D drop the main

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No photos

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Email from family and friends dated March 29, 2014

Subject: PPJ Day 19

We had decent wind yesterday and most of the night, but around 3am it died and never came back today.  We ran the engine for a couple hours in the wee hours of the morning since we would have had to run the generator anyway to charge the batteries.  But once the sun came up I could no longer justify it, so I shut it down.  Then we were going a blistering 3 kts (half of that due to the current in our favor) so Alex and I dropped the main sail since it wasn’t helping and was only flogging.  Yes, that’s right, Alex and I dropped the main without Tim.  I know it’s been over a year already, but there are some (OK, most) sail changes that I just don’t do alone.  I contemplated waking Tim up, but after I thought it through, I figured Alex and I could do it.  And it really wasn’t one of my most stellar parenting moments.  A little less yelling and a little more coaching would have gone over a lot better.  I hadn’t already coached him on the new main halyard, which has A LOT more friction than the old one and twists and knots up much more easily.  I’ve told Tim a few times that it concerns me if we ever need to get the main down quickly in deteriorating weather, but I digress.  Anyway, Alex had a hard time paying out the halyard.  And I was not mother of the year today.  Perhaps a bit out of guilt, or laziness, or both, I let the boys talk me into no school today.  To celebrate getting out of the counter-current… yeah, that’s it.  So, we baked bread and chocolate chip cookies and pretty much did nothing else all day. 

Just another day at sea.

P.S. Perhaps I should provide a little more detail.  When we drop the main, usually I am on the halyard and Tim is on the hard bimini top guiding the sail down into the stackpack.  So, today, Alex was me and I was Tim.  Yes, I had my harness on, and yes I was clipped on, but while Alex was struggling to pay out the halyard I was getting knocked around by the boom and trying to pull the sail down.  Fun times.

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At 3/30/2014 6:08 AM (utc) our position was 04°04.18’S 131°48.59’W

March 28, 2014

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Logbook – March 28, 2014 (Punta de Mita to Hiva Oa)

Passage Log Highlights

• 0909 main + genoa
• Min TWS 9.1 kts SE
• Max TWS 13.4 kts SE

Daily Notes

• Day 18

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No photos

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Email to family and friends dated March 28, 2014

Subject: PPJ Day 18

We made it out of the countercurrent finally once we got to about 2 deg, 45 min south.  The sea state has settled down and we now have about 1 kt of current in our favor.  We had good winds all day in the 8-12 kt range and we are now just pressing on a course directly to the Marquesas.

The boys have each started new reading books for school, and as usual, I read them too so I can be prepared to discuss things with them.  Coincidentally, both of the books are survival stories about boys who have been left alone.  Alex’s is set in medieval England, and Brenden’s is set in 18th century northern New England.  The boys aren’t left alone because their parents have died or are negligent or anything.  They are left alone because life is hard and times called for the boys to shoulder a bit of responsibility.  And it made me start thinking about how sheltered kids are today.  I’m glad that out here cruising the boys have a bit more independence and have a bit more responsibility than they ever did at home, but sometimes I’m not sure we go far enough.  I guess I still need to work on taking off ALL of the bubble wrap.  🙂

All is well on board, we are about 5 days away if the winds cooperate (which they aren’t right now, though).

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At 3/29/2014 2:22 PM (utc) our position was 03°34.48’S 130°55.20’W

March 17, 2014

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Logbook – March 17, 2014 (Punta de Mita to Hiva Oa)

• 1318 main + genniker
• Min TWS 9.4 kts SE
• Max TWS 14.3 kts SE

Daily Notes

• Time change UTC – 8
• Genoa repairs – All Day!
• More squalls

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Email to family and friends dated March 27, 2014

Subject: PPJ Day 17

We find ourselves stuck in the equatorial counter current, which is knocking off 1-2 kts from our boat speed.  We’ve been trying to get as far south as possible to get out of it, but today that just didn’t work out.  We had to pull down the genoa, and Tim made some repairs to it.  During that time, we flew the genniker, which simply cannot point that high to windward, so we spent the day going more west than south.  But Tim did a fine job on genoa sewing, and we got it back up before dark, so we’ve been able to point a little higher so far through the night.  We made another time change today, so Exodus time is now UTC -8 hours.  We are in the home stretch, and it feels good.

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At 3/28/2014 7:00 AM (utc) our position was 01°39.83’S 128°58.55’W

March 26, 2014

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Logbook – March 26, 2014 (Punta de Mita to Hiva Oa)

Passage Log Highlights

• 0202 port engine, main, genoa
• 0355 port engine off
• 1500 depart equator
• Min TWS 2.9 kts SE
• Max TWS 11.7 kts SE

Daily Notes

• Equator crossing!!!

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Email to family and friends dated March 16, 2014

Subject: Day 16 – Equator Crossing

There are now four new shellbacks on board Exodus.  We crossed the equator today!  We hove-to just after crossing and had a ceremony to toast to Neptune.  Then we all cut our hair and gave it to Neptune along with other gifts from each of us.  The boys got buzz cuts.  I passed on that, but Tim did cut it well above my shoulders.  The conditions were very calm so the boys all went for a swim off the stern of the boat.  We tied a line and let it trail just in case someone started drifting.  We made pizza and cookies, and overall a great day was had by all.  The wind is dead and we have about a knot and a half of current against us, so it’s slow going right now.  According to the forecast we shouldn’t expect a whole lot of wind until we get down to about 5 deg south.  Last night and tonight with winds in about the 5 kt range, we’ve elected to run one of the engines to charge the batteries rather than the generator, since we haven’t motored much we have more of margin on diesel at this point than gasoline (for the generator).  And the extra knot or 2 of boat speed we get is nice too when we’re just slogging along.

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At 3/26/2014 2:15 PM (utc) our position was 00°14.65’N 127°19.60’W

Editor’s note: This seems to be the ONE time I forgot to update our GPS location…  really, we were south of the equator at this point!

March 25, 2014

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Logbook – March 25, 2014 (Punta de Mita to Hiva Oa)

Passage Log Highlights

• 1225 D–>T main + genoa
• 2321 Port engine on 1700 rpm

Daily Notes

• Day 15
• Engine instead of generator to charge batteries

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No Photos

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Email to family and friends dated March 25, 2014

Subject: PPJ Day 15

When we were way back by Isla Socorro, and the boobies kept dive bombing our fishing lures, I made the comment that pretty soon there would be no birds and when we got close to the Marquesas and saw birds again they would be a welcome sight.  I was dead wrong.  There have birds with us the whole way!  I wonder what they are doing way out here so far from land, but they don’t seem to care that I wonder.  They are with us, our silent companions.  Along with the flying fish and the occasional pod of dolphins.  The flying fish are quite funny.  They scatter to either side as Exodus plows through the water, looking like little mechanical drones that can’t quite seem to get into the air.  And in the morning there are usually several unfortunate ones the became stranded on the deck during the flying frenzy.  Tim uses them as bait.

There’s not much really to report from today.  School, meals, naps, computer, heading checks, sail trims.  Winds have been light, but the up side of that is the ride is more comfortable. 

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At 3/25/2014 3:51 PM (utc) our position was 01°13.39’N 127°01.75’W

March 24, 2014

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Logbook – March 24, 2014 (Punta de Mita to Hiva Oa)

Passage Log Highlights

• 0508 T–>D Main + genoa
• Min TWS 7.5 kts SE
• Max TWS 13.9 kts SE

Daily Notes

• The most amazing rainbow

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Email to family and friends dated March 24, 2014

Subject: PPJ Day 14 – Week 2

I almost didn’t write an update today, because I went to bed right after dinner instead of messing around on the computer as usual.  I am so saturated with fatigue I’m having a hard time completing everyday tasks.  Like cooking dinner last night.  I made a simple stir fry and I felt like I had prepared a seven course meal.  I’m up for my 11pm watch, and feeling a little better now.

Anyway, we think we are mostly through the ITCZ.  Prevailing winds are from the SE now, and there’s only an occasional squall that pops up and if we get hit it’s just a lot of rain and not much wind.  The winds have died down tonight and we are moving slowly, but still moving between 3-5 kts. 

We saw the most incredible rainbow today.  It was a full arc and was brighter and more vivid than any rainbow I’ve ever seen.  Photos will not do it justice.

Since it’s the end of week 2, I thought I’d do an accounting of our fresh produce on board.  Here’s what we have left:

2 squash

8 carrots

1 jalapeno

2 jicama

4 cucumbers

1 head of cabbage (will likely not get eaten, I have no idea why I keep buying these, I guess because people say they keep well.  Doesn’t matter if you don’t like them, though)

1/4 head of cauliflower

5 onions

2 garlic

1/3 of a 5 lb bag of potatoes

5 oranges

Not too bad, I guess.  My only regret is how early we ran out of apples, which was a few days ago. I brought 24, and in hindsight I would have doubled that.  They are a standard snack around here, and we are missing them.

We have plenty of frozen and canned veggies, but I am savoring the last few fresh squash and carrots. 

So, all of you back at home with access to whole foods, please, have a kale salad for me.

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At 3/25/2014 5:57 AM (utc) our position was 02°16.94’N 126°00.78’W