Thursday 30 June 2022

New moon, end of June. Second this month. By sunset Friday should see sliver of new crescent chasing Sol to the western horizon, then over the following fourteen nights losing the race as it slowly grows larger and works its way across the night sky to finally rise full in the east just as the sun disappears.

Wind and sea calm. Motoring north to position for catching future northwest wind into Sitka. Becoming noticeably cooler. Sea temp 21C and falling along with water in tank and heater. One of us showered last night - cool, not cold. Jan waited for engine heated warmth to shower tonight. Without new energy water heater holds a few kelvins for a couple of days, but eventually water for slooshing greasy and stinky bits will nearly match air temperature. One of us will probably brave the chill and assert he is (with Russian accent), "strong as bull". Another, demurring from freezing her tahtahs, will reply, "and half as smart".

Damaged genoa has been living, rolled up, on upper, port lifeline since Friday. No worries as weather has been lenient and from starboard. Since it's calm, but expect sporty conditions from port side in a day or so decided to flake sail and store in a bag. This exercise with Marie at helm and other three on deck folding sail, fraught with mishap, unaccountably went off without a hitch. Sail bag now lashed to upper deck and secure. We're ready for the tempest so probably won't get one.

Radar shut itself down and hid. Didn't actually hide as we almost immediately located the thing at its accustomed location atop pole mount, but couldn't find a signal. After massaging control heads for awhile to no effect finally dug behind electrical panel and futzed with fuses and connections and such and voila! radar. No idea what we did, but, well... radar. Of course now there are no showers around to watch for.

There were, however, two crossing ships that appeared to be on a lane between LA and Singapore Strait. Initial contacts were via AIS which stands for Avoidance Instrument System. In fact, have forgotten what the acronym means, but all commercial ships and most blue water yachts now transmit a VHF signal to electronic charts that shows among other things where the target is, it's course, how close it will get and when. Cool technology that probably makes busting around in the dark somewhat safer. Besides radar and AIS, actually cast eyes on one ship at eleven nm, first siting since leaving Oahu. To be seen at that range she must have been big, but not as huge as one further away we didn't see with length shown as .2 nautical miles. Wouldn't want that rascal sneaking up on us in the dark.

Jack & Jan