0400 Watch on Wednesday, 10/16
We are back in the groove of our usual watch schedule. For those who don't remember/know how we work it:
0700-1200 John
1200-1700 Linda
1700-2100 John
2100-0100 Linda
0100-0400 John
0400-0700 Linda
This way John gets the sunset watch and I get the sunrise watch, which is how we both prefer it. The long five hour watches during the day give us a chance to catch up on any sleep we missed during the night, and to do chores.
We are deliberately sailing more slowly than we could be. Although Nakia is built to take a pounding neither of us likes crashing and bashing. So we've been running under a reefed main, with the staysail, and occasionally a scrap of jib out. The jib usually gets rolled up or at least shortened at night when we are most likely to have rain squalls pass over us. With the good moon light we have now we can see these clouds coming far in the distance. They usually bring us increased winds and hopefully a boat wash, and only last for about 15-30 minutes at a time. We can definitely use a nightly wash with all the salt spray we are taking over the foredeck.
John here: Early Wednesday morning (about 0300) we were hit by yet another squall. It has been very unsettled the last 36 hours. This squall lasted a lot longer and seemed a bit stronger then the ones before. After about 15 minutes of very high wind I heard (and felt) a loud BANG! I quickly turned on all the deck lights to see what had broken but didn't find anything out of the ordinary. All the sails were still set and pulling and the boat was still on course. I waited another half hour before it calmed down enough to brave a trip on deck when I found that three out of four of the 5/16" bolts that hold the staysail had broken. The last was bent at an extreme angle and looked like it could go at any time. I quickly dropped the staysail and decided to wait for daylight to take a closer look. 0500 found me on deck with a length of 1/4" Spectra rope which I used to build an emergency attachment point for the staysail stay and the sail itself. It took over two hours, but seems to be holding for now. We should only need the staysail for another 10 days or so, hopefully by then the wind will come aft and the jib can take over. In the meantime, I'll be checking the Spectra rope for signs of failure four times a day.
We also had a couple of visiting squid last night. These are particularly annoying because even though we can neither see them when they land or smell them after they've sat around and dried on deck, Ziggy can smell them as soon as they stop wriggling. Of course any fresh seafood is Mana for Z, so he immediately wants to go for a walk on deck to slurp them up. Not such a good idea when it's blowing 20 kts and water is constantly flying over the deck. We do our best, but he eventually gets out on deck, and comes back when he gets tired of being splashed by waves.
Day 2 Stats
Course: 23 degrees True
Trip Mileage: 110 nm
Water Temp: 81.7 to 82.6 F
Engine Hours: 0
Day 3 Stats
Course: 17 degrees True
Trip Mileage: 92 nm
Water Temp: 82.4 to 82.9 F
Engine Hours: 0
{GMST}11|06|S|144|02|W|Tuamotus to Hawaii Day 3|Day 3{GEND}
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