Hi, Everyone!

Scott is asleep, Mitch is piloting the boat and I am at the navigation station typing as we slip through the waves, our wonderful Archambault A35 effortlessly sliding along, mile after mile in a beautiful unending seascape that delights the senses, with a steady (if a bit too gentle) 9-10 knot breeze to keep us in motion.

Our voyage continues on its inexorable path. The sea remains benign, tempting us into complacency on a voyage remarkable for how easy it's been so far.

The longer it stays easy, the more I know things will change.

Every 5-6 hours, we obtain updated weather and routing information. I've just run the latest model, and it's predicting by late this afternoon, our sojourn on the calm ocean and wind speed under 10 knots, will end. These models are remarkably accurate when they are new, so we are starting to get the boat hunkered down for what I know will be a blustery final several hundred miles. We are officially under 1,000 miles to go (984 to be exact) and the prediction is an arrival on August 18 in the early dawn. Twenty one percent of this will be wind in 20-30 knots, so we are aiming well north of SF in order to arrive at the latitude of Point Area (or thereabouts) about 350 miles from the coast. This should give us a drier, faster point of sail in the heavy wind corridor that is the Nor Cal coastline. The crew is doing an excellent job and meshing well, as it takes tremendous teamwork and "going the extra mile" for one another to make for a pleasant journey, and in Scott and Mitch, I could not be happier.

We seem to out of the garbage patch, fortunately, and are looking forward to maybe seeing lots of meteors tonight and tomorrow night as well. Until the next report - over and out.