Finally a spinnaker run. Carried the big asymmetrical kite all night long boat was really moving. We put a pretty good dent in the miles left to go, knocked out a 200+ mile day. At daybreak when you could see everything, it probably wasn’t the smartest move, to run the big kite all night. I saw some 25kt winds, and Marvin saw 27 as dark clouds passed in the night. This morning when a 26kt breeze blew through, I looked up to see the unstayed top of the mast bend by what seemed to be a foot or more. DOH, that’s enough of that, we need that mast to hoist any of the available sails, so we down sized to the symmetrical spinnaker that runs at the fractional (3/4 of the mast, instead of the very top) point where there are stays to support the mast. Kept pretty much the same speed and was more forgiving in the rolling seas that were building.

Bacon and Eggs for breakfast after the spinnaker change.

Awesome run, making about 10 miles and hour most of the day. Little rain storm to wash off the boat, no other boats in sight all day.

Pasta with meat sauce, basically goulash with what ever looked like it would go. The quantity that I cooked, I thought for sure there would be leftovers, guess the crew was hungry even though no one really had a preference for dinner, double helpings were had by all.

Even Mr. Dorado decided to stop by for dinner, as I’m plating up the grub, the fishing line goes off. Pause, turn off stove, attend line, bring fish aboard, resume dinner. This time I learned how to filet the fish, our freezer is stocked with lots of Dorado, guess we’ll have to have some for breakfast, or at least for dinner tomorrow.

Woke up for a little early for my shift, as the boat was zoomin through the water. As I’m walking up, AIS collision alert goes off, I have it set on 10 range so any boat with in 10 miles goes to alert. No big deal, its 10 miles crossing in front of us. We are doing 14kt of boat speed in almost 30 knots of wind. Way over the night time rules that were setup before dark. So its time to take down the small symmetrical spinnaker, down it comes, nothing too difficult but the tack line goes through the block and is running under the boat, Marvin quickly pulls that in, but now the tack line is no longer on the starboard of the boat, we’ll have to fix that in the morning. Anyone know how to push a noodle through a 50 foot straw? Thats where the take line goes.

Running under jib alone, we are still making some 8kt times, but also the wind is dying back down, if we had the tack line, might consider putting the small spinnaker backup.

Crew is dreaming of Caribbean sun, well we already had that today, nice and hot in the sun, cool in the shade. Also enjoying knocking off miles as this is what the winds were supposed to be like for the whole trip, not just the very end.

Course over ground: 258 Speed over ground: 9.1kn Total miles through water: 719 Miles to destination: 988 kn (as a crow).

We had been flying our large spinnaker A-kite which is bigger than most.  It goes from the very top of the mast to past the deck and some times almost to the water. We had to take her down today because a squall came through with too much wind.  Matt happened to look up at the mast and noticed the top ¼ of it was bending with the pull of the spinnaker so down she came!  We put up the smaller kite which is super pretty, but does not provide as much speed.  Let me clarify, when I say not as much speed, we were averaging 30 miles per shift and that has done down to 25 miles per shift – still great!

Since it was another relatively beautiful day with no pounding and decent seas, I decided to tackle the Tupperware cabinet.  I know you are thinking “what’s the big deal”.  Let me tell you what a pain in the butt it was!  There were 3 shelves in a double cabinet full of a mix match of round, oblong, square, rectangle, and tubes Tupperware.  Plus all the lids are mixed up.  So first I organized by type, then tried to figure out what fit inside where most conveniently and then tried to find the mated lid.  Once I determined what pieces we wanted to keep (based on what could be stored easily inside another piece), I matched it to a lid and marked the container with the color of the lid.  We were able to discard over 30+ pieces of Tupperware that was either old, tired, odd shaped or cracked.  I cleaned each piece, cleaned the cupboard, inventoried everything and put it back. All I can say is √, √!

Matt caught a huge Mahi Mahi about 3’-4’ long and about 30lbs.   It was beautiful and huge.  After they brought it on board, there was a discussion about how much 150 proof should be given to the fish (to stun/numb and eventually kill him).  I liked the fact of numbing the fish as much as possible so it does not suffer (keep in mind I have a 100 gallon salt water tank at home and have had a fish tank in my life for over 20 years).  A Mahi Mahi comes out of the water a gorgeous blue and green luminescent color and the more alcohol you give them makes them turn a boring yellow.  So, some say to only give them enough to numb them and not change their color – I say, change their color and give it a rest!  Matt took the liberty to gut and clean this fish and did it “with the hands of a surgeon” according to the others. I of course did not watch.

Our shifts are all messed up because we have crossed over a time zone or two.  So my 4p-7p shift which used to fall around dinner and dark is now in the late afternoon – kind of funny.  We decided to keep the shifts as they are since we are used to the routine and who really cares what time it is when you still have 1100 miles to go J

Spinnaker. Thats all I can say, up at first light, was still light winds, 12-14 kts, exchanged all the normal canvas for one spinnaker. So we put away the main sail, rolled up the jib, and deployed an asymetrical spinnaker. It is huge.

We have a 70 foot mast, and the A-kite goes all the way to the top and can touch the water if it wasn’t full of air. The length of the bottom of the triangle is longer than the length of the boat. With the almost following seas we are rocking and rolling right along, we have covered 174 miles since yesterdays update. With wind gusts into the low 20s we have seen boat speed of up to 14kts and pretty much on course.

Cereal for breakfast while the spinnaker was getting used to its new spot pulling the boat forward.

We tried to use the SSB to call one of Captain Ron’s buddies but were not successful. Could hear some auto part dealers from Oklahoma swapping car parts tho. I’m going to have to get a HAM license to understand all the features of the SSB.

Sandwich for lunch snack on a nice sunny after noon. Shorts were attire all day, little sun burn.

I took my day watch on the lido deck, took one of the remote auto pilots to the foredeck and chilled in the shadow of the spinnaker on the nets while on watch. The kaos of the stern of the boat sounds rushing through the water are missing when on the front of the boat on a run. At 9 kts of boat speed, I think we could surf the double up wake that the hulls make behind the boat, just like on Lake Austin, except turning around to get a fallen surfer would take quite some time.

Pork chops, garlic gouda mashed potatoes and a salad Missy would be almost proud of for dinner. Would have made the required 7 elements to the salad, but the cilantro had seen better days.

Christine mentioned that it would be nice to see land again, but then laughed as she said I guess that is still several days away.

The following seas and wind from behind are giving us a quick run, and the motion is like the Ab Chair on TV. A little swing to the left, swing to the right as the quartering waves catch and pass us and the wind pulls us back on course.

I slept all the way till my 1am shift as I guess I was tired, getting up early to set the spinnaker, and Christine woke me to jibe the sails during her shift last night. So she was tired today as well. The crew is still in good spirits especially since we have found some favorable winds.

Course over ground: 276 Speed over ground: 8.7kn Total miles through water: 478 Miles to destination: 1189 kn (as a crow).