March 31 - Much improved, as advertised

Blog 3.31 Easter Sunday

STATUS REPORT:

Latitude: 8.7 deg S, 121.5 deg W (S. of Los Angeles)

2,000 miles from Galapagos, 3,000 mi from Panama Canal start, 1,000 mi to Fatu Hiva, Marquesas.

Sunny, warm, beautiful, 16-18 kt. winds from SSE, sailing under full mainsail and poled-out full jib through 8 - 10' waves from the SE.

AS ADVERTISED

In my last post I said our sailing experience was not as advertised for this classic cruise from the Galapagos to Tahiti. How things have improved!!!

We set the full jib (jenny) out to leeward on the spinnaker pole yesterday afternoon and have not changed the sails in 24 hours. We're sailing downwind with a good angle to keep the sails filled with the fresh wind. We would love to fly the spinnaker but there's TOO MUCH WIND!
The ocean is a deep blue. Life is good, and would only be improved by long period waves from the same direction as the wind instead of from different directions as we're experiencing now. But no one is complaining today!!!

Happy Easter to everyone. We really miss having Easter with friends and sharing the round of phone calls with the family. And we know our two grandsons are growing and changing during the three months we're away and look forward to seeing them (and their parents) in 7+ weeks. We're allowed to send short text-only e-mails from the boat, and receive same from Andy and Megan. So we've at least let them know we're safe and were able to exchange Easter greetings today.

CHAFE

There have been many hours taken up by sail changes since leaving Galapagos. In my previous post on "What do you do all day?" I understated the amount of effort taken up by this when the conditions are so variable. Even today when we set it and forgot it, we still must be constantly on the lookout for fittings coming loose or for lines getting chafed by the 24 hours per day rubbing they're under. This morning I went to the bow to check on the foreguy which was rigged to hold the spinnaker pole forward. It was pretty badly chafed where it had rubbed over the smooth back of the anchor over night. So we furled the jib and ran a new line through a series of four turning blocks (pulleys) so the line was running free and not touching anything else. One of the other Oysters was flying their spinnaker and the end of the halyard at the top of the mast chafed through and broke and the spinnaker floated down in front of their eyes into the water! So we're always on the lookout for wear and tear.

WATER AND LAUNDRY

We also spend some time each day doing a few articles of laundry in the sink and hanging them out to dry. There is no washing machine (well, there is actually but we can't use it because it takes too much fresh water to run) so it's better just to keep up with the hand washing as we go along than to throw all the dirty clothes into a big pile that would need to be hauled ashore and laundered later. Besides, I don't have enough clothes to last three weeks!

Speaking of fresh water, we are VERY fortunate that Quester has a reverse-osmosis (RO) watermaker aboard which is powered by the generator. On a boat without a watermaker, on a 3,000 mile crossing, conserving water would be very critical. But because the generator is run for a few hours a day to charge the batteries it can also be used to generate 30 gallons per hour of fresh water. That allows us to have all the drinking water we need, plus even take showers every day which is a BIG luxury.

We will pass another milestone in a few hours - 1,000 miles to go to our landfall in the southern Marquesas. We're cruising along beautifully and we have learned from the SSB radio checks that we have more wind than the boats farther south and west of us. Not that this is a race or anything like that, but when two or more boats are on the water, there's a little competitive thing going on...