SailBlog

I am getting into a bad routine at night, as if I have jet lag a bit, though I would think that at my pace of change I would adapt. But I think my internal clock is still on EST time to some degree. I am up most nights till after midnight, UTC that is really onward to dawn. But it is when the radio time comes through as it is just as folks are finishing work. My emails often come in at that time for weather...so by the time I sort that all out, lay down for an hour, it is itme for radio. I am finding, I don't eat dinner until later as well. But it makes for very long days. Plus it is liken to May here now with the days getting longer...the longest days are coming up still.

I should cross 45*E today, adding one more hour to the UTC for my local time. That makes it 9 hours from your EST time...Only three zones to 12 hours... a half way point!!! so though that is not an indication of being halfway done with the trip miles-wise or ETA wise, it is half way in time zones!! A half-way something!!!

I am doing about a zone every 8 days....it would be great if I could start to stack away some 900 nm weeks and pass the zones each week, but no sense even thinking that way. IS is what it IS... Amazing. It gives me a great sense of making progress as I actually change zones once a week. Truth though, is that is a pretty minimal pace but still it is often enough to feel momentum building.

It was a tough night when I finally did lay down. The winds escalated as they were suppose to up to 30kts or so. I set small sail as our course was still SE with the winds tight on the nose from the NE. I wasn't anxious to go degrees south by any means. By morn , the winds had backed a bit so that I was going essentially due east at this point. I actually made very little southing in the end, if the DeLorme is correct. It is making me a little nervous that Bob and Joan both got some odd locations for me. i am not sure what happened with that. It may have just been a lapse in email....

It is cold again, but not quite as bad a few days ago, but when the SW winds come through,I am sure the temperature will plummet with them. The northerlies have some added warm and wet to them. I am still hard on the nose but I have reduced sail so that I am pounding a little less, not worrying about speed...just not dragging the rail.

As the day progressed, the wetness turned to a steady drizzle and then it actually rained quite hard for a bit. I was caught between feeling like I should make an attempt to catch some of the rain as this is the first rain I have had. But I tell ya. It was cold cold cold. I just couldn't get myself to think about getting my rain gear out and staying out, in the pouring rain for any length of time...and it wasn't going to be an easy process.

I would need to change the boat's course so as to flatten the boat out, allow me to manipulate the main sail so the reefed sail would allow me to catch the rain coming off the distal ends...Or I would have wanted to let out the third reef and use the reef line to pick up the end of the boom, routing all the water to the mast end...But with it blowing so hard, I would have had lttle success....but still, fresh water...I could use a long cool drink of fresh water right about now. But everytime I even open the hatchway to consider going out, I was thwarted in my being...probably more my memory centers. It did't rain too long so, In the end, it wasn't a situation that would have yeilded much rain to speak of. But one of these days, it has to happen.

The wind generator had another level of breakage last night...the voltage output decreased and the sound it makes became much more gutteral, low pitched. It was still making power but not nearly so well. I got out there and stopped it...I have a feeling that the next time I try to start it, I will have trouble getting it to spin at all. It has been hard to start in moderate winds and then clunks rhythmically for an hour or so before it seemed to 'warm up' and then spin normally. But now, we will see.

Luckily, I can manage on the solar, i just have to be a little careful and avoid the stereo...so. I am not overly concerned or planning to change it out for the Ampair at this point. I can't imagine pulling that off though I will, if I must. Now that I have secured that one strut with Thixo...I will have to undo the strut from the pole end. Any way. I am not planning to change it ... maybe the brush will manage to reset itself or something...Maybe it will still work enough to help, but it sounds like a jet is taking off behind me now.

Plus, I finally got one of the bins out and it is now on the floor as a hassack on the port tack and as a seat on the stbd tack...As a hassack, I can stay bundled up in all my blankets. It is going to be a stay in bed day, just too harsh to do anything and so soaking wet outside. I had thought maybe it would 'blue-up' in the afternoon. This is the first storm I have done that presents with East winds so I am not sure what it trends like. But it has remained a full on rainy drizzly day.

In the afernoon, I wanted to sit to do some charting and I wanted to knit. As I was getting up to change position, I realized I couldn't find my phone. I knew it had to be amidst the bedding somewhere. It became a fulll on, tear the bed apart search as the slender black shape was no where to be found amidst all the dark fleece covers. i could feel a panic rising up inside, quickly becoming a total unreasonable reaction to not being able to find my phone. It was as if the panic I have felt a hundred times when I have lost my phone all converged on me at once...I was watching myself react and couldn't believe the intense attachment I have to that phone...though it does contain so much information, we can't afford to just lose them... I went through each blanket. I looked behind pillows....as much as I would like to have a totally dry area around my bunk, there are areas that are leaking and now with the rain and heavy sailing overnight, the cold and constant condensation, everything against any wall is wet. I was concerned my phone got down behind something and was getting wet. It is amazing how I use that phone for a camera most the time, stopwatch, calculator...I use it all day long, not to mention playing Sudoku to keep my brain moving. I just watched my emotions loose it as a total observer. i started to chide myself for reacting...the phone had to be here somewhere... I was apoplectic at one point...it was the intense emotions that I felt of being abused by the whole material world that lures us in to being so incredibly addicted to these electronic things. I hated the fact that I was so dependent on it at that moment. It wasn't just about losing it this one time. I realized that the gray and cold, exhaustion staying up too late was getting to me...I finally centered myself and cleared the emotions I was feeling with Anam Cara, my conscious self, accepting that the phone would show up at some point and that it was 'just a phone'. It was not life threatening. And truthfully, my whole being settled down. I was getting all cuddled into my blankets sitting up when i felt something just under my thigh...Sure enough...there was the phone. Now I have no idea how it managed to stay hidden through all the bedding checks...it was weird to be sure....but there it was, unscathed. Practice...Practicing the Clearing path...I am quite happy with my progress.

As the day gradually darkened, with no sighting of sun for the day, it was a hue that changed under the thick layer of soft rain clouds tonight, unlike the beautiful sunsets I have had these last two nights. The winds are starting to back just a bit. I was able to ease my course off the wind a bit, the boat softening its heel, the ride below a tad less dramaatic and the boat speed increasing as we are less heeled over and at a better angle to the oncoming seasstate and waves.

Sometime overnight, the winds are to continue backing until we begin to sail downwind to stay on course. The jib will then be occluded by the mainsail preventing any wind from filling the jib. Depending on what time it is and if it is still so wet outside, I will either go through the whole Pole dance, setting the whisker pole to wing on wing, or I will let out an additional reef from the main and just saili with the main until dawn. We will see. I do want to take advantage of these winds to make some real headway onward toward Australia...

The barometer has plumetted from 1030 a day or so ago to 1009...with this frontal system...a substantial decrease for sure. The temp has run near 52 degrees most of the day...but it will drop farther tonight I am sure. So...it will be no fun, if I have midnight sail changes, but I have no choice. I will make i happen. I am still optimistic that with the advancing into the summer season, the temperatures will climb at least into the 60's during the days...it makes such a difference to be able to be about the cabin without gloves and coats on...

I am not going to make it down to 44*S unless I continue to purpose to go there. I have been forced a bit south with the NE winds, so may miss the calm up ahead. But I have to say, it is a bit of a conundrum as I am so enjoying the breaks of the high slow downs and the warming up that I am looking forward to them...But if I consistently stay farther north and do that, it will add weeks to my trip overall. Will see. That is not Ok...I think. ONe day at a time.

The Birthday kids are all enjoying a fun party as I type along. I so miss them....yet, as a Noni that lives far away, I don't usually get to make these parties...I do when i can. So, it was the norm for them to have me call them during their morning and wish Charis happy birthday and get a chance to say a quick hello to whoever came to the phone. Thank you LUiS for the satelite connection.

Bob has made it successfully into the ICW and is likewise under rainy conditions making headway towards New Bern NC...as far as he may make it at this point before needing to go home to work... Hopefully Calypso will make the rest of the trip soon. Bob has a whole winter with me gone to concentrate on doing extra work on Calypso to keep him busy late into the evenings and bright and early morns. Bob will have the floor boards and all the furniture he can bring home a varnished and beautiful when I get home as well as lots of great things done he has been too busy to do...his winter therapy...

I am knitting and reading to manage the time away during this front. I am going to head to sleep but it will be an alarm night as the winds are shifting as I type... I will need to continually adjust the steering...again, until we are downwind by morning, if the timing is such. I need my beauty rest early tonight.

Keepin On Sailin On a Dream.... loving the new way of conscious awareness...Grace grace grace toward myself as I watch my self become more present, less haranged by my old emotions or at least for less time before I realize what is amiss and can clear the old pathways and make way for peace and a more reasonable approach to the present situation... finding my phone, right where I 'left it?'...

Fairest of Winds and the Love of the Ocean Only Gratitude Donna

�"Sent from my RedPort Aurora Satellite Terminal http://www.globalmarinenet.com/product/redport-aurora/ www.globalmarinenet.com www.ushuaialogistics.com www.xaxero.com www.transmarinepro.co.nz http://www.mwxc.com Chris Parker weather services www.jamestowndistributors.com www.bellplantation.om (PB2) www.caphorn.com www.marinemotion.com http://sayitright.com www.yoloadventure.com www.islandplanetsails.com www.baconsails.com