June 9
Hi All,
I just came on watch and very sleepy….2nd night syndrome….slept really, really hard and woke from deep sleep….come on coffee do your thing!!!
Weather still crappy and it’s hard to type!!
Marginally better today…..winds 12-18G22, started off port bow ENE, then last night clocked to E, right on nose, and hopefully sometime today will clock to SE. Waves calmed a little during the day to 4-6′ but last night grew to 6-9′ ESE. There are now some big rollers, 8 sec period, that Mystic handles no problem, it is these short choppy wind waves on top causing all the motion and the 1/hour tremendous boat slam….these shake the whole boat and make you cringe praying nothing breaks. Mystic is a heavy girl so 90,000 pounds slamming off a wave makes for a tremendous splash and impact…..this passage can not get over soon enough for us!!!!
Speed: We continue to lose 0.5-1.0 kts of speed due to too much pitching motion and a foul current…..ugh!!!
Boat Stuff: I forgot to mention that the day before we left Russia the Safety Officer wanted the storm windows installed…..in the process of getting the windows out of the laz, I went ahead and retrieved our crab trap and associated lines as all this stuff was buried as well. I discovered a significant leak coming from the aft cockpit port drain….ugh!!! Kathy and I had to leave to go get more cash for fuel so Mark stayed and cleaned up the mess and then attempted to reseal the deck drain. Well….not so easy….the next morning I got up at 4am to try and get more stuff done before we left the marina at 8am and sure enough the commissary bilge light comes on….oh crap….it had started to rain during the night and eventually the deck drain leaked worse and we had 1/4″ of water in the laz….yikes. We used a gasket this time with a lot of sealant and Mark got a good set on the drain cover…so far no leaks…..it took me a good hour+ to clean up all the water in the laz….ugh!!!
Stats: June 8 1900UTC (7:00am June 9 Russian Time, +12hrs GMT):
Position: 52 47N 166 16E
Traveled: 163nm today; 291nm total; 252nm to go; ETA to Attu late Sunday Russian time; lost about 8 hours from our forecast time!!!!
Course: 94M COG
Wind: 14-18G22kts E
Waves: 5-9′ ESE, 20 pts off starboard bow
Speed: current speed is 7.2 kts SOG; has varied 5.8-7.5 kts today; passage avg is 6.8kts; 1550-1650rpm
Weather: 100% cloud cover; air temp is 46*F, sea temp is 41*F…brrrrr; cabin temp 65*F…..diesel heater staying on all the time, can’t keep up with these temps, wind and no sun….ugh!!!
Boat sightings: 0…very lonely out here!
Hit something: Nothing
Wildlife: many birds including several Albatross and the cute Puffins
Fishing: Nope; too, too cold
Sail: down
Fuel burn: 1.29nmpg, normal for 1600rpm is 1.35…..I’m still 98% confident we have enough fuel to make Adak but I’m a bit stressed on these slower speeds. Yesterday’s projection indicated we had 250 gallons left when we reach Adak so still a good safety margin!!!
Hope all is well!
John
Mystic Moon
GO MYSTIC GO
