Day 14: Friday 3/29: Good Friday!!
Boisterous…..that’s the description for today…..before we would get 12 hours of rough conditions then calming for 12 hours…..today the winds and seas stayed high all day…..the ride is semi-rough….we can still get up and move around, fish and cook, but it is just darn uncomfortable. I’d say all of us are getting tired of the conditions….we remember so well the calm and moderate conditions of the first 4-5 days!!!!!
Can you believe it…..6 or 7 days to go…..right now Rose is in the lead to win the bet…..ETA 4/4 in the afternoon!!!!!
We did our 2nd time change….we are now on Alaska time (UTC -09:00)……still need to do another 1.5 hour change!!!! It will be hard to get used to being behind on time from the USA and west coast as we have been ahead for most of the last 6-7 years.
I was very tired and lethargic today…..just didn’t feel like doing anything but lay down, nap and read…..and of course fish….got a pretty good night sleep so have a bit more energy now.
I cannot believe today was Good Friday. The calendar and events don’t seem to have much meaning out here. Our world is this great seaworthy boat and all her equipment and our constant vigilance…..fuel, water, electricity, waste, radar, speed, wind, seas et al. We certainly want to celebrate Easter….just hope the seas calm so we can do it justice!!!!
Les is still working on the ER temps….we seem to have better fresh air flow but the temp is still around 114 deg F….most of this new fresh air is near the front of the Cummins….the Balmar alternator is as cool as it has ever been…..but, not true for the rest of the ER…..a conundrum!!!!
I heard from Greg at Yacht Systems and Tom on Misty Sea who gave me some ideas for the pesky Nobeltec…..none worked and in fact for a while made it worse…..but, after a few sailor terms I got it back to our work around and all were happy. Why do software programmers like to mess with success…..the old program VNS has everything on the same menu with a great help guide. TZ just says use the automatic instrument install and be happy…..well, Mr Programmer, what if it doesn’t work…..then what, you moron (and that is not a term of endearment)…..the guy must have been trained by Microsoft…….arghhhhhh!!!!!
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Position 3/30 @ 1300 UTC:
Position: 6 46S 124 23W
Traveled: 173nm today; 2110nm total; 890nm to go; ETA sometime 4/4-5
Course: 248M HDG, 247M COG
Wind: ESE (100-125M) 15-22 kts all day/night; current wind is 20 kts @ 125M deg
Waves: ESE 6-10′ swell; 10 sec period; 4-7′ wind chop 3-6 sec ESE; semi-rough ride; had to use stabilizers;
Speed: current speed is 6.8 SOG; has varied 6.6-7.5 SOG; avg 7.2 SOG today; 6.4 SOG total for passage (we planned for 6.0 but hope/want 6.5).
Weather: 80-100% cloud cover all day; a little sprinkle over the boat and you could see squalls all around us during the day; stayed cloudy all night but no squalls; seems to be clearing as daybreaks, sea temp 81.6 deg F
Boat sightings: 1 today moving north, passed 0.5 miles in front of us, the excitement of the day, a Taiwanese fishing processing boat, on AIS; 8 since we left.
Fishing: 1 toddler (bigger than yesterday and may have fed 2 people, but threw him back) Mahi, 21 total for the trip; 12 bonitos, 7 skip jack, 2 Mahi. Still nothing on the grill 🙁 ((((
Fuel Burn: After 330 hours we are burning 2.29 nmpg, 2.77 gph, 862 gallons total and 30 gallons more than expected. I’m going with Les’ fish stopping theory….now up to 27 stops at a gallon per stop so our fuel burn is right on plan!!!!!
Sail: Still up and helping
