We've had a little adventure in the last 24 hours, nothing life-threatening but rather mostly annoying. Last night, while I was asleep on break and Allan was at the nav station, we heard a loud and very sudden BANG!, not the kind of bangs we've been hearing for days when a mass of water slams into the hull, no, this was different. I lept out of bed and Allan was on his way up the companionway with a flashlight, and just as he suspected, we lost a shroud.

I got dressed and into my life vest and harness, fired up the motor, and we brought the sails down. We've been in some pretty strong winds and consistently rolling seas, which adds additional stress to the rig, even when the sails are reefed as ours were. Allan hooked in his safety tether and went forward to inspect the shroud, and tape it in place so it wouldn't do any damage to the deck. Of course, this all happens in the pitch black of night, no moon, big waves, slippery deck, lots of fun! We brought the spare halyard over to the port side and attached it for additional support, but we don't really think it's necessary.

For those of you not up on sailspeak, shrouds are the thick wire thingies that keep the mast up. They come in very handy, as you can imagine. Luckily we have quite a few of them on this boat, and this was just the aft lower shroud, one of 4 shrouds on the port side. The failure was somewhere at the top where it attaches to the mast. This is not at all uncommon, our first email was to Michael on Paikea Mist, who suffered a similar occurrence in French Polynesia. The second email was to Byron, the rigger who put this boat together for us during the commissioning stage, and the third was to designer Gerry Douglas at Catalina Yachts. We've heard from faithful Michael, mainly because he's down here in our time zone, but are still awaiting a response from Byron and Gerry. Mainly, we just want to know if the geometry will allow us to keep a bit of the genoa sail up for stability and a little push without taking any further risks.

So, here's the bad part about all of this: we'll spend the last leg of our sailing adventure in perfect wind, ingloriously motoring to Brisbane! Ah well. The good thing is, we have plenty of fuel, otherwise we'd do what I think is the next best thing: rig up a windsurfing mount on the foredeck and Allan can sail us home! Okay, we could take turns -- his arms would get tired.

Motoring in rocky seas is more woggly than anything else I can think of; without at least some sail to stabilize and balance the boat, we're now thrashing about clumsily. Every cupboard and storage space is advertising it's vacancies as the remaining contents slam from side to side, the stove gimbals fore and aft to it's full extension, the dishes slide, despite the dishtowels and hot pads we've tried to stuff into the gaps. So it's a bit noisy in the cabin, Allan doesn't even take his earplugs out half the time, probably a good idea. Even the littlest things can drive you nuts: the butter knife in the dish drainer -- slink, slank. Slink, slank. And when the big waves come, it's an exponential rhythmic din with occasional flying missiles.

We'll still get to Brisbane in good time, but not as quickly as under sail. That's the magnificent thing about a sailboat -- the wind is free and if it's steady and strong enough, you can go faster than under power, and it's a lot quieter. And don't let anyone tell you a powerboat has less movement because it doesn't heel! We're now spending our 117 gallons of expensive French diesel, enduring the constant thrum of the engine, and rocking worse than when under sail.

Otherwise, all is well. I've been wasting massive amounts of time on crossword puzzles and still trying to wade through the Old Testament, a task I consider heinously difficult, I'll leave it at that. Allan is still reading Harry Potter and we take, as I've mentioned before, a lot of naps. Our SSB radio Net will be more difficult with our fellow sailors; the engine and generator create a lot of radio noise and make reception very difficult. Still, we were able to relay through one of the boats who's closer to us on this mornings' Net, and got the message out to Mike on the boat IO, who's volunteered to be Net Controller for our small group.

Another 48 hours or so remain, maybe by then I'll be through 2nd Kings or something. By the way, so far, the computer hasn't been able to beat me at Scrabble. Nevermind I've got it on the easiest setting. I still beat the pants off my cyber opponent, and that makes me feel real smart!