Pachuca must be very close to Hawaii now. Here is the daily sms;
NOON 9 DEC GMT-10. 18N32, 154W01. 2179 NM FROM TAHITI, 72 NM TO HAWAII. Noon-Noon: 129 NM. NOW RAINY WITH LIGHT, VARIABLE WIND. SLOW SAILING.
Here is the latest email from Pachuca, as received today;
Tahiti-Hawaii 3
4 December 2008
In the morning the galley pump started sucking air which told us that the starboard water tank was “dry”. I put that word in quotation marks because we realized later that because of the heel of the boat and the distance of the water outlet pipe from the bottom of the tank there would in fact have been some water still in the tank. Nevertheless I worked on the assumption that we had used all 140 liters of water in the tank over a 12-day period implying water usage at 11.7 liters per day. We hove to and plumbed the port tank that services the head and estimated that there were 60 liters remaining, suggesting that we had used 80 liters out of that tank. That is a total consumption of 220 liters total consumption, and 18 liters per day between the two of us.
We did some calculations and concluded that without additional water we would have to reduce our consumption from what I would call “comfortable restraint” to something more stringent. To that end we formulated a plan of drawing our water from the port tank in measured and recorded quantities and aim for a total usage of 10 liters per day.
We were still moving well and our noon-noon distance for the day was 154 nm.
We had not had any serious rain since the passage from NZ to Raivavae when we managed to get 50 liters of water for our tank. The rain that we were now frequently encountering came from low fast-moving clouds and was very light, making water extraction from the sail a real battle.
At this point I said a prayer. I explained the situation to the sailors who had gone before us and asked them to help us get rain water. This came out of an experience I had during my solo sail on my second boat Angie from Fremantle to Esperance about 15 years previously It was night and I was at the tiller exhausted, wet, cold, and a bit despondent. I began to feel the presence of something. Then I began to sense the sky above me filled with the faces of people whom I didn't know. I thought about it for a while and concluded that it must be the faces of the sailors who had gone before me. I felt a connection with them and I took great comfort from this.
Anyway, I asked them for help and we ran into series of clouds in the late afternoon and managed to harvest maybe 8 liters of water. Another drizzle later gave me enough water to cook the spaghetti. I was grateful for that. We had just finished a cheer-us-up Drambuie after dinner when the boat started to speed up very smoothly, like it was on rails. Arnold went into the cockpit to find another squall, and this time the rain was serious. I stripped down to my underpants and went into the cockpit with two buckets, a plastic pot, and the large red funnel. The work in the dark was wet and somewhat risky. Arnold worked the helm. With one hand hooked over the boom and on tippy toes with one foot on the coaming and one foot on the seat I would reach into a deep fold in the sail which had one reef in it with the plastic pot, then transfer that water to the two buckets resting on the seat against the coaming. Soon the buckets were full and the really interesting part began. I had to take each bucket to the filler inlet of the starboard tank which was fortunately on the weather (i.e. high) side of the boat. I would use my fingers to unscrew the filler cap which I had already loosened with a screw driver, put the big funnel in, and the pour the water in as carefully as I could. This was all against the backdrop of the boat pitching, rolling, and yawing as she tore along at over 6 kt with sea water either flying in through the air and running along the deck. I was tethered to a jack line during the entire time but I really didn't want the experience of being dragged through the water at over 6 kt until Arnold could heave the boat to. By repeating this procedure we managed to harvest what I estimate to be between 55 and 60 liters of water, sufficient to see us through to Hawaii.
I didn't forget our friends the sailors and thanked them very much for their help. Yes I know, I am an ex computer man out of the rational world of Cartesian logic. Nevertheless that is the way it was. Maybe that is why I wanted to go to sea.
That night the weather got rough. I described is as “a night to get through”. The winds were erratic as the mini weather systems came and went but we were prudent enough to put in that second reef to ensure a quiet night. Well, the second reef ensured a safe night, though not a quiet one. Arnold dealt with winds of 23 and 24 kt and the boat was heeled over hard on a narrow reach that became a close-hauled beat.
5 December 2008
I took over the watch at 1 AM and found the same conditions that Arnold had been dealing with. The wind had backed during his watch and he had been forced to alter our course 20 degrees to the west. We reduced the headsail by another 50 % and I eased the mainsail a few degrees to reduce weather helm. The rest of the night involved monitoring the boat as the autopilot did a marvelous job of steering the boat through that rough and confused sea. Toward dawn I noticed that the wind had veered a little bit so I adjusted our course 3 degrees to the north. Soon I adjusted another 3 degrees. By the time Arnold took over the watch at 7 AM Pachuca was once again sailing down the rhumb line.
Our noon-noon distance for the day was 134 nm, pretty respectable considering that we had been dealing with variable winds and done hours of close-hauled sailing against a rough sea. At this point we were 665 nm from Hawaii.
The night sail turned out to be good, sort of. We went into the night with a single reef and by midnight Arnold had reduced the jib several times and was still having trouble controlling the boat against the 20+ knot winds. We put in the second reef and came up with a policy that whenever we are going into the night with the wind 15 kt or higher we will put in a reef.
6 December 200
We sailed well all day with a wonderful 17 kt wind on our starboard beam, traveling at about 6.5 kt with one reef in the mainsail and a no. 2 jib. This was sailing at its best and we really enjoyed it, particularly since the autopilot was relieving us of steering duties. During the morning Arnold spotted a ship, the first vessel of any kind since Tahiti. I came well within 10 miles of us, headed roughly East. However, we were not getting any AIS information on this ship on our plotter. I contacted the vessel on VHF 16 and he replied that he had his AIS on. We recycled our chart plotter and AIS transponder but still got nothing from the ship. At this point we had no direct evidence that there was anything wrong with our AIS system, but we would be very glad to see it reporting ships as we approached Hawaii.
Arnold and were are more rested, relaxed, confident, and looking forward to landfall at Hawaii. Our noon-noon distance for the day was a respectable 162 nautical miles. Not long after noon we reached another milestone when our distance to Cape Kumukahi at the “big island” of Hawaii reached 500 nm. I took over the watch just before noon and soon after I decided to spice up the sailing a bit by shaking out the reef. The result was that instead of “dawdling” along at a sedate 6.5 kt we started rocking along at 7.5 kt. Why not? We were on a beam reach sailing along the crests and troughs rather than bashing into the, and the boat was on a nice and steady heel. By the way, a book I have on board indicates that the hull speed of a 39-footer like Pachuca is 8.3 kt. We had seen the boat do more briefly at times, but probably under the influence of a following current.
In the afternoon while Arnold caught up on his sleep I took the time to reduce two sextant sights of the rising moon in the East and setting sun in the West that I had taken the previous day. I plotted the results on graph paper and the fix I got was 13 nm from where I knew that we had been at the time. That isn't perfect but I can't been too hard on myself about it. Taking an accurate sighting off a pitching boat where the horizon is being regularly obscured by intervening swells is not easy for the inexperienced. Also, the two lines of position were not orthogonal but crossed each other at a bit of an angle. This resulted in a fix 13 nm off even though one line of position was only 3 nm off and the other 7 nm off. I plan to keep taking these sights regularly to get faster with the reductions and minimize the too-many dumb errors that I make. I'll try some star shots soon but I'll wait until we get a completely cloudless morning. I've got enough problems without having to deal with the target stars regularly disappearing behind the clouds. With the star shots I'll be able to get 3 or more lines of position which should yield a better fix by helping to negate any systematic over or under reading of the sextant altitudes that I may have.
Arnold rightfully can't see the point in all of this celestial navigation work when a boat can carry many GPS's. He is totally correct in my opinion. Even a bad lightning strike is unlikely to knock out every hand-held GPS stashed around the boat. However, celestial navigation is something that I had to learn in the 1980's before the widespread use of GPS's and it is a skill that I want to maintain for its own sake. ... The other reason is that I am a hopeless romantic.
We went into the night with a double reef which was the correct decision for the first part of the evening. However as the night wore on the wind died down and Arnold relied on the jib to keep up our boat speed.
7 December 2008
This was Pearl Harbor day as we approached Hawaii.
Soon after taking over the watch at midnight I shook out the 2nd reef when I saw our boat speed dropping to 5.0 kt. The evening went well, though the sea was very lumpy. In the morning we were still moving well at about 6 kt on a close reach but the sea was rough and we were getting a lot of water on the deck. I baked another loaf of bread in the morning and we discussed running the engine for the first time in 4 days with continual use of the auto pilot to charge the batteries.
Our noon-noon distance for the day was 157 nm. We were 1910 nm from Tahiti and 350 nm from Hawaii.
We started the engine at 4.10 PM and ran it for exactly one hour. This brought up the house bank to 12.7 V which should be sufficient to get us to Hawaii, given the daily contributions of the solar panels and wind charger.
We went into the night with a double reef and short jib doing 6.0-6.5 kt.
8 December 2008
By the time I relieved Arnold at midnight the wind had died down and Arnold had rolled out more jib. We had a half-moon up and the sea was calming down. I rolled out more jib and as dawn approached the wind picked up again and we were once again hiking along at about 6.5 kt. At about 7 AM Arnold took over the watch. I soon produced the customary hot buttered toast and soon I was in the bunk sleeping. It woke up at 11.30 AM very refreshed. Soon we were shaking out both reefs and rolled out the jib to speed up the boat against a dying wind that had backed somewhat to the north. It was one of those splendid sailing days: clear sunny sky, calm blue sea, gentle breeze.
Our noon-noon distance for the day was 152 nm. We were only 200 nm from Hawaii. We discussed the timing our our entry. It looked like we would arrive at night, at least too late in the day to make an entry; so we expected to stooge around for a few hours waiting for dawn and the start if the working day so that we could go into the harbour in full daylight under good instructions from the local authority. We decided not to heave to lest the current and prevailing wind push us too far to the SW, forcing us to do some expensive tacking the next morning.
By this point I had decided on the new name for our autopilot. Let's call him “Vistarr”. I know that is an unusual name but it is a simple two-syllable name that should roll off the tongue easily. I could offer justifications such as the “vis” and “vista” evocative of “face” or “vision”, maybe “st” suggesting “steering”, or the obvious “star”. The genesis is more personal (and important to me): VIctorSTephenAndRoland&Reg.
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