Pacific Day 10
Sarah here. No photos today as we try and cut down on WiFi time for battery consumption. But this is designed to be an old school blog so it seems fitting anyway.
Thanks to the two of you still reading after that announcement!
Quick update:
Days 7-9: It was hot. Humidity hit. I think I’m the only one that has slept at least 5 hours in a day for the last 10 days. (Spoiler alert: schedule change planned! See below)
On day 8, just as Chelsea and Jesse were finally about to get an hour to nap, we had the connections go bad for all but one of our solar panels. Thank goodness we’ve got one! Plus a hefty tank of diesel to recharge the batteries for essentials. Jesse spent a couple hours in the sweat box working on shoring up our remaining connection.
Winds were a touch lighter than we had hoped day 7-9, but very sailable. Of course light winds doesn’t mean no swell, which has added to the little sleep phenomenon as people get tossed side to side.
I really don’t think I’ll know how to walk straight when I set foot on land in the future.
Seasickness comes and goes but we’re 0/4 for throwing up which is far better than many of the boats around us it sounds like.
Day 10 we finally hit the ITCZ which for you non-sailing folks is the area around the equator where there is much less wind but tons of squalls (they look like a cloud pouring rain and swirling wind when you see them approach on the horizon). Some of them move very quickly (much quicker than our little 40ft boat) so we’re about 50-50 for avoiding them.
That being said, during a squall, for a brief, very glorious 5-10 minutes, the temperature drops and fresh rain pours out of the sky which is my new version of paradise. Can’t recommend it enough.
The ITCZ changes size, and I’m told it’s seemingly on the large size for the moment, and quite active with squalls, so it’ll be a few days of motor sailing punctuated by quick action periods of reefing the sails, closing all the hatches, and swirling about in the wind and rain.
For those of you keeping track, still no pirates. Though we did see a 5x5 foot raft made of logs lashed together silently float by with two red footed boobies (birds for you non-birding folks) sitting on top and it reminded me of Pirates of the Caribbean for some reason. Don’t know why, but there you have it.
We tend to see a piece of garbage float by every day or 2 and it brings the whole crew to the cockpit to ooh and ah and place bets on what we think it is as we try and steer close enough to take a peak. What can I say, the scenery doesn’t change much out here otherwise. It reminds me of being a kid playing the license plate game on a multi day roadtrip.
Day 11: Last night Jesse tried out sleeping in the cockpit (the only place he can actually stretch out with his height) to escape the heat below deck. He has requested we tie him to the mast tonight for sleep with a little breeze since at this point I think we could all fall sleep while standing up.
We’re going to try swapping to 3 hour watches tonight and I’m hopeful (and probably delusional) that it should help us all a little in the sleep department. We’ll try and keep you posted!
Today Jesse read a whole page in a book which is the most time he’s had to sit down in the last 1.5 weeks.
Chelsea has been busy building the Taj Mahal of shade covers out of towels, and she is by far the most skilled at this trade out of all of us.
And most importantly, Dirk just made a sausage leek omelette for breakfast. Woohoo! Time to go enjoy!
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