John's Blog Updated. Original post with photos: http://travel.reservationkey.com Latitude: 14.23157 Longitude: -114.12309

Watching the sun rise, with the rays piercing down through the clouds, was a nice way to start the day. Bruce stayed on watch longer than usual so I started at 4:00 am instead of 3.

Since I had been sleeping since 8:30pm I was feeling pretty awake and stayed on watch until the sun rose, my first sunrise since we started. Antoine woke up early and we filled out the log book together, which was also a good way to help him figure out how to read the instruments.

Since the wind was starting to pick up we launched the spinnaker and kept it up until about 1pm. It is really fun to drive the boat with the spinnaker up and a good wind. We averaged about 7,5 knots , with a top speed of 8.7 knots while I was driving. I've been thinking about how I am not able to play in today and tomorrow's Bohemian Club Orchestra concerts, with great comradeship and the oyster appetizers and bottomless wine, and as much as I miss that, driving a boat in the middle of the Pacific Ocean is a pretty unique and amazing experience. I've played in probably hundreds of concerts over the years, but being out here like this is something that is probably not very likely to happen again, or if so, not for many, many years. In addition to looking forward to reaching French Polynesia I am also realizing that the trip across the Pacific is just as much a part of the adventure as arriving at our destinations.

Our lunch today was a lot of fun. Bruce made a delicious salad garnished with mango, avocado and tomatoes, topped with tune/salmon cakes. I enjoyed cutting one of our pineapples, in the style of a Thai beach vendor, which I learned about during my first trip to Thailand in 2001.

There were lots of fish jumping and chasing other fish all over around the boat earlier so I put out a line. Maybe we will have fresh sushi for dinner. Otherwise we will have to settle for barbeque steaks and potatoes.