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180 hours into the passage to Marshall Islands

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Knocking off the miles, as the forecast said, it would knock us off our route. We had put nearly 40 miles to east in the bank to prepare for being knocked off course. Well that was not enough son!

I have been watching a fishing fleet of 9 or 10 boats, that have been canvasing across our path. Mornings check and they were all traveling west, and just far enough west that with our wind shift we could still stay east of them. All good, decent sailing. That 40 miles to the east.. was quickly depleted as we were being forced to sail a bit west of north. No worries the wind should shift and bring us back the other direction later.

I thought the shortest distance between 2 points was a straight line, but we get to do “S” turns, just to keep it interesting.

Mid after noon, checked up on my fishing fleet.. Damn, if they didn’t do a 180 degree turn, now all 9 of them are crossing our path over the course of 30 miles, or some 5-6 hours of dodging 30 meter long fishing boats towing lines? nets? dunno, but what you gonna do, just aim for them.. they’ll be gone when you get there, at least that’s the way race cars do it.

Fishing fleet

And then the sunsets before crossing our first targets path, just to add to the fun. In the dark we dance!

Then I develop a bad case of acne/pimples/zits all over my screen. I ran to get the clearasil cream, but the rubbing it on the radar screen just made them blurry. As soon as one would go by, another would appear.. So begins the night of dodge squall and dodge fishing fleet, all at the same time. Why does this always happen before a big dance?

Acne

The first squall no problems, we were able to get to the ‘good’ side to go around, its east side. The second one, not so lucky.. took us another 5 miles west with its winds on the ‘bad side’. We have now lost the orginal 40 miles to the east and now another 40 miles to the west of where we want to go. Doh! While deciding how to proceed, lower sails and wake Christine up when it clears up, or take sails down and motor for a bit and wake her to raise the sails. Just then the radar alarm went off again, with another big squall dead ahead. Drop sails, and see how this plays out.

Played out well, next squall brought 34kts of driving rain, and just as we were arriving to the dance The first of the fishing fleet was 4 miles off our starboard, hidden in the driving rain, 8 more to go.

Egg Plant Parmesan from our passage meal collection.

240 miles to go, was going to be a 2 more sleeps till finish kinda pace, but with the current acne issue, might be 3 sleeps, as we will want to arrive in the daylight.. It’s all good.

All good on board if not a bit soggy.. It’ll dry tho…

Off to find more acne medicine, aka Clearasil.

140 hours into the passage to Marshall Islands

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Dangerously close to breaking the 500 miles left barrier. More importantly the first 24 hours of actual sailing. It’s now a thing, complete these last few hours without burning more dinosaur juice.

Wind has been light and shifty all day. Maximum of 10kt, with 30 degree shifts every 10-15 minutes. I’d say fluky winds. One minute you are going off course left, a few minutes later off on the right. Checking your path, you would definitely be pulled over and given a breath test. “No I have not been drinking, officer. I’m just following the wind, I swear. He has been like this all day, honest. You should really see what he is on“

Moon rise, light winds, making it work

We are counting our blessings on making it through the SPCZ thunderstorm alley with nearly no chaos, the one squall that we did encounter, was with sails down so no issue other than a fresh water rinse of the boat.

Next up is the ITCZ. Looks like it’ll start rinsing the boat in just a bit more than 24 hours. With those showers also comes a change in wind direction. Yup, right on the nose. We have been heading a bit farther East to be ready for the wind direction change. Well really, I had been really hoping the forecast would change the North East winds to merely East winds, then it would be a non issue. Doesn’t look to be happening, now that we are a few days out, the forecast should be close to reality.

Stopped into Jason’s Deli (are they still even in business?) for dinner and picked up some loaded baked potatoes for dinner. Loaded with bbq pulled pork. Since we couldn’t source the ‘gigantic’ spuds the Texas chain uses we opted for garden fresh Kamara (Kiwi), Yams (proper English?), Sweet Potato (American).. but these were “Kamala” as they came from the gardens of Gaua, Vanuatu. Yummy..

Left to go, 500 miles

Equator, 75 miles

Diesel burned, 0 liters. And for people from Texas, that is 0 gallons.😎

First 24 Hours to Marshalls

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A perfect morning for a sail. A little gray, not too much sun to get sun burnt. Nice gentle breeze, no drama when the sails are up. Still behind the reef so very little waves. Pretty sweet.

Sails up, and off to the races we go. First day, going conservative start with one reef in the main sail, just incase the forecast is a little off. Works perfectly, nice easy sail. As “Lonely Island’s” song goes “Busting 8 knots in my flippy floppies”. Nice start.

Still concerned about the SPCZ thunderstorms that would be ahead, but just as Moses did the red sea, the SPCZ split and left us alone. Warnings to the left of us, and some to the right, but the center was clear. Yippie.

However, the splitting left us with very little wind to sail with so we changed the stereo station from Pop to Country we landed on “Little Big Towns” “Pontoon” with the Chorus .. Motor Boating. For the next few days at least that “Motor boating” song will be stuck in your head and ours as we endure the drone of an engine to make reasonable progress.

The blue zone, comes with perks too. No electrical worries, batteries will be fully charged. Water tanks full, no reason not to run the water maker. Warm water, all the warm water you use.

Glassy conditions, sail ready should the wind show up

The blue zone was in the forecast, it just came a little sooner than hoping and the blue zone has gotten much larger ahead of us. We will not be setting any 24 distance records with just one motor running, we only dropped off a mere 130 nm toward Majuro, Marshall Islands in the first 24 hours.

So all good on the big watery road, a nice chicken peanut curry for dinner. Too many miles left to count…. 😎