September 7, 2009, near the Pacific great circle routes
Aquila: "Supertanker at 37 22 north, 133 40 west, this is sailing vessel Aquila" very short delay... then in a thick Arabic accent... tanker: "[unintelligble] to the vessel calling, we have you at 6 miles away" Aquila: "Excellent, we agree. What is your vessel's name?" tanker: [unintelligble] tanker: "Do you have any other business with us?" Aquila: "Well, yes, where are you coming from and where are you bound?" tanker: "We are coming from the Persian gulf and bound for [long pause] L.A." Aquila: "Thank you. Aquila clear. tanker: "out"
This happened just before sundown yesterday, after we had seen a *very* big tanker crossing our stern. Probably 1200 feet long. While we knew we were not going to be a scratch on his bow, we were curious about where we were relative to the shipping routes. The conversation ran up against a couple of prevalent cruisers' myths. Most importantly, we learned that such boats will, at least sometimes, answer hails on the radio... and in English! And to a male voice calling, no less. We also learned that someone was on watch, and actually watching the radar. And that Aquila shows up at decent range (it takes a couple of miles for such a boat to turn). All good news, in addition to providing a few minutes of entertainment.
The westerly came back about 9 last night, and has been good ever since. A little rain blowing through, but still nice progress. Looks like there's a chance we might make in to Drakes Bay on Wednesday night. But still a little early to tell.
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September 6, 2009, under high pressure
It's the kind of day where sailors work on their knots, play Go, or idly dream as the glassy waters slide by. We're motoring again, and are likely to do this for a couple more days. Oh, well, we knew this could happen.
The trash is thinning out where we are, but it's still out there behind us, I am pretty sure. It prompted one of those daydreams that might actually be practical. Someone needs to propose this to the Gates Foundation, if they haven't already. Here's the idea in a nutshell: a solar powered garbage-sweeping barge to circle the gyre, picking up the trash as it goes. It would be kind of expensive - a thousand horsepower of solar cells might cost upward of a couple million dollars. But low maintenance - you could probably run it with a crew of 2 and a couple of volunteers. One engineer/mate and a licensed skipper. It would be useful if these were also writers, since it wouldn't be exactly exciting duty. But you could have a tennis court and a hot tub (solar, of course) and a big library. So it would sweep back and forth across the trash zone at some stately pace, compacting plastic as it went like a mighty trash truck. It would probably only run during the day to avoid having a huge battery bank. Every time it got close to a port, a tug would tow it in to be emptied of trash and for a crew rotation. The only downside I see to the plan is the expected crash in glass-net-float prices, but that is a small slice of the global economy. I dunno, maybe the sun has baked our brains, but this wacky idea seems viable.
A few other things have happened. We had a cameo appearance of a small school of dolphins, and we still have flying fish and the occasional tropicbird. We're also seeing quite a few black-footed albatrosses, the common one of the north Pacific. That puts us in an curious mix of southern and northern species.
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September 5, 2009, about 600 miles out
We were looking over the grib files yesterday, and working out the details of the rather complicated predictions (which didn't turn out to be true, anyway). But it's often a bit hard to work out since they come coded in Universal Time, which was nine hours ahead of our time. So, as I often do at such moments, I turned to Sandra who was looking over my shoulder, and said, "Today's the 4th, right?" And she replies, "Yes, and that means tomorrow is... ummm... our 5th wedding anniversary!" Surprised both of us. We're not sure how to make the mahi mahi sufficiently festive for the occasion, since our stores are running low. This morning saw the last of the eggs go into a batch of pancakes - that's always a treat. Maybe a nice bouillabaisse. But I am sure Sandra will come up with something delicious.
We got unexpectedly nice sailing yesterday and much of the night. We were expecting, based on the gribs, to have the wind go north and get light. Instead, it picked up from the northwest and we had more great broad reaching, at times averaging 7.5-8 knots. It's lightened up now, and with an increasing swell, we're rolling a bit, but it's still pleasant.
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September 4, 2009, North Pacific Ocean
The war is being fought over our heads in the atmosphere. We're in the DMZ right now. In between a high that has its home to the southwest, but is trying to take territory to the west, and a low entrenched up in the north. This low sent a skirmishing party (a weak trough) across us last night, bringing periods of drizzle and shifting winds. The high seems to be on the warpath now, though. The sun is out, the barometer is rising, and the wind is starting to fill in from the northwest. But it's still fluky. For modest consolation, the models are having a tough time of it with this battle too - each day for the last 3 the forecast has changed pretty dramatically. The latest has the high dominating for the next couple of days, which isn't necessarily good news for a speedy passage. The better news is that we seem to have gotten enough north under our belts, so we won't have to bash upwind the last couple hundred miles. Or so it appears, but we will see what happens out here in the trenches.
We were zipping along on the westerly yesterday when the biggest mahi mahi of the trip struck. It was a 15-pounder, which will probably feed us 4 meals or so. It might be the last one. We love the pink feather lure, and so do the fish, apparently. Last night, David fixed it with a delicate coconut curry sauce. Delicious!
The trash is changing appearance as we head east too. We used to have more buoyant items, like net floats and chunks of styrofoam. Now we have heavier stuff with less windage, like bits of net, broken plastic boxes, and a tire. Anyone mising a spare tire? Sorry, we didn't pick it up for you.
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September 3, 2009, North Pacific Ocean
We got our westerly in the middle of the night, and it's a beaut. Like being in the trades again, only we're going the other way. The last time we had the jib out on the whisker pole was back in May, on the run in to Rarotonga. In honor of that experience, David is planning to do some hand-steering, to "see if I can beat Jake." No one has yet, but he might be the man. Jake sure could use a rest; he deserves it. The forecasts suggested a chance of rain, but so far it's been beautiful. Even the slow, light-air sailing we were doing yesterday was extremely pleasant, like a day on the Catalina Channel. Only with big swells running. But not enough to keep Sandra from baking a batch of oatmeal cookies. The cookie monster awakes!
There's a pleasing symmetry about this run on the westerlies, compared against the first leg out from Auckland. There, at about latitude 36 south, we were riding the effects of a low sweeping across to the south of us. Now we're doing the same thing in a different hemisphere, on the other end of the same leg. Using a low to the north this time, because of the Coriolis effects being opposite up here. I dunno, I find this sort of thing amusing anyway. Maybe I've been at sea too long.
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September 2, 2009, North Pacific Gyre
Well, it had to happen, according to the predictions, and it sure did. In the middle of the morning, the high swept in quietly and absorbed us. We're motoring again, this time headed a bit farther to the north. This is both strategically useful and tactically wise. The strategy has to do with getting a better run on the expected strong northerlies along the coast. The tactics are to do with the next system coming our way. There's another low coming across tonight or tomorrow, and the farther to the north we get, the better westerlies it will bring to us. This looks like a pretty fast-moving one, so we want to use the westerlies as well as we can in the time we are given. In practice, we have split the made-good exactly between getting north and getting to our destination, to pick the direction that our diesel breeze will carry us.
The fishing line is out again, after a bit of a break. We'd had a run of mahi mahi in 6 meals out of eight, so we fixed a big ol' corned beef for a couple of meals. That took care of it, and we're all ready for fish again.
The alert among you looking at the Google map would be able to work out a milestone we just crossed this morning: we lost a digit. No, no one got a finger caught. We're within a thousand miles of the Golden Gate! On the odds, this puts us about 8 days out, but as always, this number isn't to be taken to the bank. The odds, after all, come from other passages. Anyone want to start a betting pool? Jeff? We won't be able to moderate, though. That is probably good, since we then won't be tempted to swing the outcome. The obvious time-point to bet on would be the moment we pass under the Golden Gate Bridge. Now, the crafty bettor would want to note which direction we are coming in from. If we're coming in from the northwest, we plan, for sentimental and touristic reasons, to drop hook in Drake's Bay for one night, and then come down the next day. If we are coming in from the south or west, we will probably sail straight in. So, since the pool should close well before we get there, you are betting on whether we've gotten enough northing in yet or not. We don't know this either...
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