Well we made it through day number one!

Long line at Customs and Immigration with all the boats wanting to leave on this “weather window”. Everyone talking in line about strategies and why this is a good time to leave. I’m not convinced lots of non favorable conditions and a dead line at the end made for some tough decisions but decided to go with the heard. Leaving Fiji in a conga line or the autobahn was pretty crazy we counted 20+ boats in a line all motoring out of the wind shadow looking to start sailing.

Normally I like to start these longer passages early in the day, to have a full day of nice sunlight and getting “sea legs” or used to the motion of the boat in the day light before darkness settles in. There are no street lights to guide your way at night, and we are in a “new moon” phase so the moon doesn’t eve show up to help light the way. It’s also overcast and grey so no stars – not really a champagne sailing kinda day but off we go.

We get out the pass around 2pm and barely before dark have the full force of the wind that was lurking behind the shadow of the big FIji island. Then the seas that go with 20knots of wind also showed up. Bouncy but fast night. Not that comfortable. Even started with only half of the sail, 2 reefs. Eventually raised some more, but the a bit later dropped it back down.

At the start there were lots of boats around, but as the night grew on everyone was taking their own path and speed, and then there were no boat lights on the horizon before day break. Some were still on AIS, radio tracking. With all the bouncing around our AIS antenna had enough of trying to hold on any longer and jumped ship. We saw him hanging from a wire contemplating his fate, but there was nothing we could do to change his mind. Eventually he let go of the coax and bailed on us. He held in there for 26000 miles at the top of the mast since Costa Rica, I can only imagine he was getting a little tired of all those waves we have bounce through. So no we are not seeing the boat even electronically or worse yet, not broadcasting our position to nearby boats so they can see us. Something to address at the first camp site along the way, meaning New Zealand.

All well onboard. Christine is well medicated and not showing signs of being green or wanting to talk to the fish. She even got her some pulled pork tacos to start the journey off right. 1100 miles as the crow flies on this journey down south into much colder weather.

I was asked if I was gong to wear socks.. “Socks??” I asked, and he replied “it’s like mittens but for your toes”. Wonder if they work with Flip-Flops?