An email from Pachuca !

Hi,

below is an email from Pachuca, sent today. It was a very difficult process to get email working at sea. Perhaps I will outline the problems overcome and processes involved later for any interested "geeks" reading this :). Anyway, without further ado, here is the email.

thanks Stephen.


Tahiti-Hawaii 1


22 November 2008

We cast off for Hawaii at 10.30 AM. The wind was blowing from off and I didn't like the idea of motoring from my bow-out Mediterranean orientation down wind then making a tight turn to the right to avoid the next jetty and the steel boat on it. I was going to pull the stern of the boat to make the bow point more favourably but we opted for Arnold's suggestion that we pull the bow over and tie the boat side on to the jetty pointing out. This took an hour to arrange but the effort was worth it because we made a calm and drama-free departure.

The wind was gentle but workable. In the afternoon I took some sextant observations of the sun and the sight I reduced put the line of position within 2 nm of where I knew that we were. This was encouraging. We proceeded north at 2-3 kt and passed west of the Tetioroa atoll that lies 30 nm north of Papeete during the early night. I took out a big lump of white tuna that I had purchased in the market on Friday and cooked the lot. We had the fish steaks with white rice, carrots, and soy sauce with a few glasses of chilled white wine and we both thought that it was a pretty good meal. The rest of the cooked fish would be heated for the next night's meal.

Arnold took the first night watch and he had a difficult time keeping the boat moving with winds that dropped below 5 kt at times. Fortunately the sea was calm which enabled him to nurse the boat along. I took over the watch at 1.30 AM to find the lights of Papeete just a glow on the horizon and the wind better. As my watch progressed the wind got better, veered from NNE to ENE so we made good progress during the rest of the night in the direction of N-NNE on an easy beat.

Our plan is to head N until we reach the equator at longitude W147. Anything west of N is to be avoided lest we run the risk of having to beat our way to Hawaii against a NE trade wind.
We were definitely in the tropics. The boat was hot during the day to the point where sleep is almost impossible until nightfall. However, the nights on deck are a delight. Real tee shirt and shorts weather.

23 November 2008

At 9 AM we were 75 nm north of Papeete. This was a great relief to both of us because the wind forecast predicted light winds until we got 2 or 3 degrees (120 or 180 nm) north of Tahiti, and we were afraid of getting stalled in that curious windless bubble that has enveloped Tahiti for about a week. The indications were that we would be able to break into the zone of steady easterly winds without too much trouble. We sailed all day at 5-6 kt heading at about 010 degress off a breeze that went from E to NE. The boat was very warm inside, to the point where we found it difficult to sleep.

As evening approached the wind stiffened to 17-18 kt from the NE. After dinner Arnold took the watch and I tried to get some sleep in the heat. Thirty minutes later we ran into a rain squall and the wind got over 20 kt. I went on deck and we put in a reef for the night. I took over the watch at midnight and the wind had backed even more toward the north and we were beating to windward just slightly off the wind. An hour later I saw Arnold up and about and I asked him to help me put in the second reef because the wind was consistently over 20 kt.

24 Nov 2008

We sailed all night in somewhat difficult conditions with the sea rising and sheets of water running over the deck with the occasional burst of spray reaching the cockpit. We had made excellent times of 5.5-.6.5 kt in the direction that we wanted to go. However, the boat got damp inside. Arnold had reported water cascading through the solar powered fan in the head and in the night I swapped the fan for the plastic cover to seal the hole. Water was dripping through the vents into the main cabin and I remembered to spin the air scoops around to face aft. In the morning the vents were still dripping which called for future investigation. Also the cabin hatch leaks when sheets of water pass over the cabin. We will have to either reseal it or get a new hatch. The exhaust fan plug in the head was still dripping, and I suspected that an O-ring is missing. This will be replaced. And of course we were still shipping water into the bilge as we always do when beating into a sea. This would surely be our friend the anchor well, which will be repaired in Seattle. However, there was good news.

The forecastle V-berth area was bone dry. The new hatch that we installed in Opua was doing its job. Also, the plastic inspection hatch leading to the anchor well was watertight due to a job that I had done on it with silicone sealant. Also, an extremely irritating leak over the galley area seemed to have been fixed. To track that down I had removed the ceiling panel over the galley which led me to re caulking the entire perimeter of the main hatch “turtle”.

Because the boat was sealed up the interior was warm and steamy. We were hoping that the wind would veer to the E or even SE as a good trade wind should behave. This would put us on a much more comfortable point of sail.

Arnold reported a noon-to-noon distance of 130 nm for the previous 24 hours.
It seemed that Arnold's lead in moving the “Lifetag” base station from the middle of the cabin to the instrument area above the companion way had paid off. Arnold had visited the pulpit once and we had both put in many hours at the steering station and the man-overboard alarm did not go once.

Pachuca came equipped with 5 electric fans, a legacy of her years in Hong Kong. I had removed the two cabin fans (they are now in my garage, I think) but fortunately left the other three on board. I spent a very hot and sweaty hour moving the fan from the head, where it did no good and kept getting in our way, and mounted it on the port side of the cabin where it can be orientated to cool either the berth or the navigation table. I then repositioned the fan in the starboard quarter berth where we keep our tools, materials, and spares to the starboard side of the cabin so that it can cool either the berth or the galley. The result was good, making life inside the cabin that much more tolerable.

The wind moderated a few knots in the late afternoon and I shook out the second reef and went to a single reef on the mainsail and the jib rolled in small – about no. 4. I wanted to get most of the drive from the mainsail and leave the jib as short as possible to (1) use only the heavier rear section of the sail and (2) minimize flogging stress on it whenever we got careless with or steering and luffed the sail. Immediately the configuration felt right. The boat was moving better with only a moderate heel and little weather helm. For the next hour I forgot the anxieties and discomforts of the passage and enjoyed the simple pleasure of sailing the boat. I told Arnold that we could have been off the W.A. Coast sailing in their 20 kt sea breeze with Rottnest Island that way and Mandurah back that way. We carried this configuration into the night knowing that we could shorten sail if we had to.

That night we had spaghetti. To one of those splendid jars of sauce that Brenda left us I added some black olives, capers, and onion. Yummy!

25 November 2008

The sail configuration carried us well all night. When I woke at midnight for the changeover I noted that the boat speed was about 6.5 kt. Arnold reported that he had dealt with winds of up to 23 kt with no problems. At 1 AM I took over the helm standing up with legs wide apart, wheel close to my chest, watching with pleasure Pachuca punching through the waves under a canopy of stars. The tumblehome hull (i.e. bulges out at the sides) that had caused me so much worry when approaching jetties was providing useful buoyancy to counteract heel. The long slender bow that makes her sensitive to weight at the bow and robs me of interior space was doing a beautiful job of piercing the waves. That big slab of a lead keel that gives me a 2.3 meter draft that I frequently complain about was allowing us to carry the sail with ease. Even the low freeboard of the boat which makes her a little wet on deck was now an asset because it minimized resistance to the wind and the water.

It is all about tradeoffs, and the result is a pretty good windward boat. I shudder at the thought of how we would fare against this wind in one of those beamy, spacious, comfortable, lumbering 18 ton steel boats particularly if it was ketch rigged.
At 5 AM we crossed the line marking the official end of our visit to French Polynesia and entered the territorial waters of Kiribati. The next milestone would probably be the equator, 12.3 degrees of latitude away, each degree representing 60 nm.

Just after dawn we got some serious (though short-lived) rain. I collected half a bucket of rain water. This may not sound like much from a suburban perspective but on Pachuca it meant that I could have my first bath in four days. I stripped down and had a good wash with salt water and shampoo. I then carefully ladled the rain water to rinse myself. After Arnold took over the watch at 6.30 AM I gave myself the facial “works”: shave with mustache, eyebrow, ear and nose trim. Trimming my nose with a sharp pair of scissors in the pitching boat was challenging. Afterwards I was feeling pretty pleased with myself. I would have felt even more pleased if I had been able to collect a bit more water for Arnold, but he reported other rain about.

Our power system was managing very well. At 10 AM after almost exactly three full days of sailing the display reported 641 amp hours representing 69 % of our capacity still available. We had been getting a lot of help from the wind charger which was putting out 2, 3, and 4 amps 24 hours a day. During the day the solar panels would make their contribution, providing close to 9 amps in the middle sunny day and even 3 or 4 amps through the clouds. Our plan was to delay a battery-charging engine run as long as possible – when we got near 50% capacity or the “house” bank go close to 12 V. We figured that the hungrier the batteries are the faster the alternator will pour amps into them.

The calculations for the noon report indicated that we had covered 135 nm in the previous 24 hours.

Unfortunately this could wind was not to last. In mid-afternoon we passed through a rain squall (more squall than rain) and emerged with the wind backing even more to the west and speed below 8 knots. We persevered into the night with winds generally moderate from the NE but disrupted repeatedly by numerous squalls. Just before dark we managed to capture one half bucket of fresh water and Arnold was able to have his bath. Dinner was bacon, eggs over easy, and white rice.

End of email