Getting close. Forgot to send and update yesterday, but all is well. Yesterday the weather did as forecast actually predicted. Died completely, the water was so glassy smooth it was hard to tell where the water became sky. I dropped a 2 lb weight on the fishing line down 50+ feet a could see it clear as day. The water is that clear and the surface that smooth.
No wind, no waves so the engine was running, Oh well that is what the forecast called for and we did have a great time in Gambier postponing the trip north long and longer. We could have left on Monday, as that is when the forecast looked marginally better. Now with hindsight, if we had waited till Monday we would have had zero wind until it was blowing on the nose for the second part of the trip. We are out ahead of that fun.
Taking naps, eating food, checking the horizon and instruments keep the days going. Christine is watching a some of the movies we have on the hard drive, eliminating the duplicates and organizing everything. I fixed the oven/stove automatic lighter again. Course I completely disassembled it completely, had the electrical tester out trying to find the cause. Seemed to point to the piazzo igniter, but as a last resort I tried another battery and voila. Back in business. For the record, I had already tried to batteries previously and tested them with the tester they all had juice all the way to the igniter. Oh well, new battery and sparky is lighting up again.
Now on track for a morning arrival at sunrise and hopefully at ‘slack’ tide to make entering the atoll easy as the passes or entrances can be challenging with currents, based on tide and weather. So you are never supposed to arrive new ports at night, here the second challenge is timing the tide and then add in the need for sunlight high in the sky to see the coral heads after you enter the lagoon. All part of the life.
Boat sails pretty good in light winds, something we haven’t had much practice in, we are managing 90% of wind speed in boat speed today so the engine has been given a break. We shall see how long.
60 of 452 miles left to go. [realtime]
At 5/22/2019 @ 2:17 AM UTC Our position: 18°40.96’S, 140°15.19’W Traveling 5.3 heading 314T
Google says we are here www.google.com/maps/place/-18.68267,-140.25317
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Awesome day, couldn’t ask for better weather. Wait, that is NOT what the forecast said! We actually found enough wind to turn off the engine this morning. The wind was keeping a steady 8 knots of breeze, shifting around a bit, but still pretty nice as there was no sea state. An extremely comfortable day sailing. Could almost be lake conditions except we did cover lots of miles at 6-7 knots most of the day. With some of the wind shifts we had to adjust the sails to get back on course of course. 🙂
Had a Sunday big breakfast of bacon, hash browns and eggs that hit the spot after the morning nap, recovering from the late night shifts.
We had a little pizza party before we left our friends behind and there were some left over fish cakes, that we are going to devour for dinner. Smells yummy as they are warming up just now.
Will probably have to run the generator a bit this eve, as we have been making water most of the day and the solar panels are shaded by the sails. Had thought the wind was going to lay down and we’d be back running with an engine on. Hopefully the wind continues on.
Cheers, all good on aboard, cruising along.
298 of 452 miles left to go. [realtime]
At 5/20/2019 @ 2:03 AM UTC Our position: 21°21.05’S, 137°06.31’W Traveling 7.4 heading 301T
Google says we are here www.google.com/maps/place/-21.35083,-137.10517
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So long Gambiers.
We made some great friends and hung out with the locals like we were family. Learned the fish we CAN eat, spear fished a few. Caught lobsters at low tide, explored the pearl farms snorkeled, paddle boarded, hiked miles, fought for supplies from the supply ship, anchored in crowded and isolated bays. Sad to leave and move on but there is more to see.
There is virtually no wind or waves in our forecast so we are motoring, we did get 10 knots of wind under one dark cloud that gave us a nice boost. The best part of motoring is that the batteries and water tanks will be completely full when we arrive. The huge full moon is awesome night light.
We should be in Hao in about 3 days at our conservative engine speed for fuel consumption, then about a week there exploring before heading to crowded Tahiti.
All good on board, main sail is up, we rolled the jib when the wind dropped to 2 knots.
Would love to post pictures but the internet was definitely not up to the task, but we will do so when we encounter to good WiFi.
409 of 452 miles left to go. [realtime]
At 5/19/2019 @ 4:45 AM UTC Our position: 22°38.16’S, 135°39.61’W Traveling 4.5 heading 312T
Google says we are here www.google.com/maps/place/-22.63600,-135.66017
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