Some people have iron stomachs and never get sea sick but for us we aren't blessed like that so that we have to earn our resistance to sea sickness. The first two days of any trip are lived differently. I usually avoid going below except for essentials and then keep the time short. Nancy precooks light meals. Any work below makes me feel queasy and I hate that feeling as it affects everything I do. By the second week life at sea becomes more pleasant and routine. Jill asked us to describe our daily routine and as I think about it, I realize that we have little control over that routine. Everything we do is dependent on the weather, our proximity to land, our safety, or failures of boat equipment. So no day is the same. We can wake expecting to do one thing and be driven to do something else.

On a "normal" day, I usually arise at maybe 0400. Nancy has been taking much of the night watches as she enjoys listening to audiobooks. With so little traffic out here�...We went 2 weeks without any sightings of other boats, she will sometimes nap in the cockpit. When I'm cleaned up, I'll take some coffee out of the thermos and perhaps have a slice of banana nut bread that Nancy makes so well and then join her in the cockpit. We'll chat for a few minutes then she goes below and goes to sleep. That's what she is doing now. Sunrise is around 0600 and I will adjust sails and course accordingly and wait until 07:30 for the SSB radio net to begin. There are about twenty sailboats in our westward bound group and we all try to check-in with our position and local weather conditions. We rotate as net controllers. If there is no unusual business the net takes something less than an hour. By this time Nancy has usually awakend and if we are going to have a hot breakfast (weather permitting) then she'll start cooking it. After breakfast and after the net I usually will run our generator as the boat requires a great deal of electricity to run the autopilot and lights. We'll do any major sail changes at that time. Sometimes we'll furl in the poled out head sails, take down the poles and raise the spinnaker if the winds are light and the weather is stable. We almost never will leave the spinnaker up at night. Too much to go wrong in the middle of nowhere! Once the sails are pulling then she'll go back down to rest and I will stay in the cockpit. Frequently, I'll stay there most of the day either listening to an audiobook, music, or just napping. I may tackle some easy boat jobs. With stable weather, the sails rarely need tending and the boat just rolls on like a train. The miles add up and every 6 or 7 days we need to set the clocks back an hour. Nancy will usually cook a hot dinner that I or we eat early like at 4:00 pm and then we get ready for the evening. The spinnaker gets taken down, other sails go up. The evening net starts at 1830 local time, Nancy retires to bed and after the net I go back up to stand watch until she wakes up. Sometimes it 22:00 sometimes as late as 01:00. At around 21:30 I usually try to get email by radio and download another weather file to get an idea of the wind speed and direction for the next several days to plan our strategy. Occaisionally the propagation is too bad and we're unable to access any mail. After that I write in the logbook of the day's events and run the generator for a second or third time. By that time,hopefully(!), Nancy is now up so I can get some rest.

That's my normal day. I'm sure Nancy's day is so different you'll think she's on a different boat. Her day to follow!

From the Crew of Always Saturday