Distance sailed in last 24 hours: 194 nm
Distance to Honokohau, Hawaii: 773 nm
Latitude: 18 02.789 N
Longitude: 143 19.638 W
COG: 273M
SOG: 8.7 kts under sail
Wind: 16 kts ENE
Seas: 5 ft E swell, 3 ft wind waves
Weather: 60% Cloud Cover
Barometric Pressure: 1014.9, rising
Sea Temperature: 76 F
Happy Memorial Day Monday to all of our friends and family in the US. We hope you're all having a wonderful long weekend. Out here on the ocean, we've gotta admit that we're envious of those of you getting a day off.
The night's calms continued yesterday morning until they convinced us it was a good idea to put up the spinnaker. We keep trying new ways to launch it. We're confident we'll have a reliable system by the time we arrive in the islands. Unfortunately, winds continue to be fickle some of the time. We had a period in the afternoon with winds over 20 knots, but they tapered off as evening descended. We spent the night with wind between 8 to 15 knots, with the higher winds around squalls. It wasn't until around the time of the last watch change at 1330Z (4:30 a.m. Samadhi Time) that it began to freshen again.
This morning finds us sailing in a much better breeze, and surfing on the fairly square seas. Samadhi takes off with great eagerness down the face of waves, with spray shooting out from the side of the hull. We reach the bottom of the trough going well over 12 knots, then slow to 8.5 or 9 as we await the next wave. Fun!
Around mid-morning yesterday, we had a sat phone call from the boys' Abuela Linda in New York. It was great to chat with her. Nicholas regaled her with the story of the tuna that we caught with one of the lures she gave us. He must be prescient because...
We were relaxing in the early afternoon when all of a sudden, we heard the clicker on one of the reels go off. The boys scrambled to get their harnesses on while Phil and Kelly rushed on deck without pause. Sure enough, it was the starboard rod making the racket, the one with the 12" green and black 'doorknob' lure rigged with dual 12/0 hooks, one of the lures Abuela Linda had brought Alexander on her visit in March.
The rod was nearly doubled over, the line was already at the spectra backing (meaning we had 250 yards out! 400 to go), and the fish was still making its screaming first run! Phillip got the boat stopped while Kelly went to retrieve the other lure, the little Tuna Catcher. Alexander helped furl the sails, and Nicholas got the cameras, just in case. Kelly fought the big fish with Phil at the helm, but we weren't successful this time. After a 15 minute struggle the fish showed us who was master and took off with some of our gear! We kept the rod, reel, and most of the Spectra- the fish got everything else. We could see the fish leaping several hundred yards astern of us, making splashes much bigger than any dolphin we've come across would. The billfish was massive and silver but that is about all we could tell. It's behavior says "marlin", probably blue marlin.
Our unrefrigerated produce is still doing great. The limes were starting to look a little peaked though, so we decided to juice the lot. All we can say coming out of the experience is that we're glad we don't run a bar. We now have almost a gallon of fresh lime juice in the cooler! It's too bad we don't have any gelatin aboard to make pies.
We have changed course slightly due to a shift in wind. Advice from our weather router has us sailing this direction for the next few days until we are closer to Hawaii. Assuming the winds cooperate, we're now planning to go via south point on our way to Honokohau. It should be quite spectacular to sail in the lee of the 10,000' volcano!
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