present position: N 5deg 31' E 146deg 52' SOG 5.9, COG 087deg True

estimated 24hr position N 5deg 38.5' E 149deg 7.4'

baro: 29.74, last 12hrs fluctuating as low as 29.65 (which is another little drop below yesterday's range)
wind: now NE 6kts and has been dropping the past 3 hrs; for most of the past 12hrs wind was ENE-NE-E 16-19kts
seas: seas have calmed a bit due to drop in wind, but I cannot see them at this time; in past 12 hrs, besides surface chop, steep 3 meter, short period, was common
cloud: At local sunset (4 hrs ago) cloud cover was 60% with relatively clear skies in the N-NW quadrant; because of the half-moon, I can see
that our cloud cover now is mostly cirrus, with the same open quadrant, although we have seen a flicker of lightning in the distance directly ahead

para-vane stabalzers were put in the water about 8 hrs ago to smooth out the ride; for most of the last 12 hours our SOG was low 5kts with frequent excursions to low 4kts
and lower; we are now in high 5kts and occaional 6. you may notice we've changed our COG effective with this report. There's a couple of sea mounts up ahead which
come very close to the surface, which we'll be in the area of 24hrs from now and we wish to jog above those. it turns out that the same COG lines us up with our
waypoint to line up for Pohnpei, so we're just pointing towards it a day or so earlier than we'd planned.

all is well with crew and the machinery



it is official; we've broken 700 nm to Pohnpei and also the halfway point from Palau... faint cheers. We are happy that the wind has dropped a bit, and the seas as well.
'Wade and Roger sleeping; Wade having recently come off watch and Roger will follow me. David is just going off-watch; I start now, following him.

It was bouncy that last of last night and all of today; not my most favorite thing; but Shearwater is handling it well, as is the crew.
This afternoon past, Roger and Capt David installed our jack-line, covers on the dorade ports and plugs in the hull vents, while Wade battened down the hatches (literally)
We also reviewed deployment of the sea anchor, should the wind have really gotten up. No problems, just being cautious and getting things done while we can.

we had one vessel cross our path earlier today -- a 600' cargo ship Kyowa Rose, headed for Rabul, PNG, which is pretty much straight south of us.

I'm flailing about for something to write about, but really, other than that I've slept today in 4 different places on the boat for various periods of time; that I've almost finished
the 4 volume Russian supernatural fiction series (Oh Thank Goodness!, it's really trash) and that my skin is prickly from the constant heat, sweat and salt on everything... there's
not that much to report.