DAY FOUR

At about 1 PM yesterday I got rain. Since I was getting wet anyway I fetched a bucket of salt water, stripped down, and had a bath in the cockpit. I let what was left of the rain rinse me off and finished the job with about 1.5 liters of fresh water.

The winds were fickle around that cloud but once I was past it the sky cleared and the wind steadied to NE at over 10 kt. The wind gradually strengthened and from the consistency of the water to the horizon it looked like the first serious wind since my departure from Ala Wai. Soon Pachuca was beating to windward against an apparent wind of 13-16 kt on a relatively calm sea. It felt familiar and it felt good.

For the rest of the afternoon Pachuca sailed at over 5 kt on a stbd tack, first NW then steadily veering to N then 010. In the late afternoon I rolled the jib down to a no. 2. At 6.30 PM I decided to put in a reef for the night. The boat was running at about 4.5 kt and I didn't want to lose any more speed but I had promised myself and others that I would sail conservatively. I looked at the SOG (speed over the ground) and it was 4.1 kt. I put in the reef, marveled at its shape and told myself that it set better than the full mainsail. I then went below and saw that the SOG was 5.2 kt. Ten minutes later the SOG was still over 5 kt. Go figure.

Shortly before dusk two sea birds started to take an interest in the boat. After several abortive attempts one of then landed on the pulpit. I took a photo for the blog. At dawn I saw that both birds were on the pulpit. Maybe they're headed for Alaska.

I had my 7.30 PM radio session with Richard. He was still becalmed and was going to lay ahull all night. He sounded frustrated. It was his sixteenth passage from Hawaii to the NW coast and I suspect this is one of his worst. He said that the boat's bottom needs cleaning and anti fouling which must be hurting its performance.

After speaking with Richard I saw that Pachuca was comfortably doing over 5 kt due north, still being steered by the Monitor. I could see no point in waking up every 30 minutes, given that I was away from the shipping lanes. I figure that if I am fresh I am more likely to awake in response to any change in the boat, and less likely to miss an alarm. I turned on the AIS alarm (which will go off if a ship is less than 24 minutes away or within a perimeter of 6 nm) and set the alarm clock to midnight. At midnight and at 2 AM all was well.

At 3.30 AM I was woken by a bang of the boom, signifying slack wind. I got dressed and went on deck to find that the wind had slacked to under 10 kt and had backed to where Pachuca's heading was 330. The party was over but I must have sailed over 75 nm in the past 14 hours. At first light Pachuca was on autohelm, course 338 T (true), SOG 2.9 kt with an apparent wind of less than 7 kt. I could only hope that this was a pre-dawn lull and that the wind would pick up after sunup. I wanted to shake out the reef but didn't want to disturb my passengers until the sun was up. It seemed like the ... human thing to do. At sunup the birds started to stretch their wings and soon they took flight, circled the boat as if to say good bye, then went off no doubt looking for breakfast. During my morning deck inspection I saw as I had expected that they had left small deposits as mementos of their stay.

The wind strengthened and by 9 AM I was making 4.2-4.8 kt COG 325 with an apparent wind of 12-15 kt.

I noticed that the ice box and refrigerator compartments had a lot of water in them, the result of the melting of the two ice blocks and one bag of crushed ice with which I had sailed out of Ala Wai. The water looked reasonably clean so I put it in the plastic washing machine with some detergent and threw in yesterday's set of under clothes. I'll let the boat agitate the wash for a few days during which I will add successive sets of under clothes. When I have a reasonable load I'll rinse the clothes with a few liters of fresh water.

For lunch I had four eggs and cooked the remaining packet of bacon lest it spoil. In these conditions I have plenty of power to spare, particularly since the Monitor is doing most of the steering. I plan to replace the broken Danfoss with a new one, probably in Port Townsend.