Around 4:00 AM Sara scurried about the cockpit starring hard at the radar then moving quickly to look ahead starboard then to port, her eyes straining, her mind questioning, “Is that a boat? Is that a light? Is my mind playing tricks” The radar dots appear then quickly disappear except this one dot seemed to linger. Back and forth, finally her mind began to ease as the radar dot vanished and there did not appear to be another boat, just precipitation dots from heavy clouds. The wind is cold, the night is black, and clouds loom in the sky covering any light from the stars. Still alert and her nerves slowly settling, she sat back down, when out of the corner of her eye a sudden spark of light came from the starboard quarter. In her mind she said, “I swear that light was not there before, could it be a mast light or maybe a large tanker”? She zoomed the radar range in and out hoping the refresh of the screen might help to identify this object. The light started to grow bigger and bigger and her fear grew inside. She blinked the salty sea air from her eye several times and instantly calmed as the light not only got bigger but was beginning to take the shape of a crescent moon. It was the moon! She laughed at herself and thought about how the night can play funny tricks on your eyes. She watched the moon grow and could almost see the warmth from the sun rays cast upon the little sliver barely hovering above the water. The moon made the shape of a smile and glow stronger and stronger. The clouds quickly covered the light and only shadow and shades of black remained. Several minutes passed by and the moon rose higher than the clouds and sparkled its light on the water.
We were a little disappointed that our wind speed decreased and only knocked off 151 miles from noon to noon. We crossed our “Destination to the Hawaiian islands” waypoint at 5:41:00 AM. We are still far enough away from the islands that we cannot even see the Big Island. As this being our 14th day at sea it was so hard to not just stop at the Big Island. We have conceded that we do not think we will make Monday Night BBQ, but if we were to stop at the Big Island now we might put ourselves in jeopardy of not having optimal winds in a week to return to the Ala Wai Small Boat Harbor, Honolulu, so we are pressing on to the Ala Wai.
We finally did it! We turned the boat a few degrees to point ourselves downwind to fly our giant yellow and black spinnaker for the first time. We have only ever spinnakered together during Friday Night Sailing Races so there were a couple of lessons to be learned, but all and all she is flying beautifully! We named her Bumblebee because she is a (sung in your favorite happy song) “a happy bumblebee flying across the sea”, haha. We could have chose a caterpillar or hornet or something else yellow and black but a bumblebee seems our preferred name choice.
Banana update: We did our best to keep up with the ripening bananas. But alas, even using a dozen this morning for banana crepes and banana bread, 3 we were too far gone for even that. We are not sure if eating all but 3 is good or if it indicates we have a banana eating problem?
Cheers,
Wade and Sara
Math Be Hard For Sailors – Ala Wai
Destination: Hawaiian Islands Ala Wai Small Boat Harbor (21°16.795’N, 157°50.743’W) Prize: Hawaiian post card from us to you and a black pearl with shell Submissions are accepted until 4/24/16.
Please only submit the date and time only, no need for your crazy calculations via ComfortCruising.com Math Be Hard For Sailors Contact Form. Weather: Sunny and partly cloudy
Ves. Pos. 20°3.729’N, 154°24.496’W
SOG: 7.2 kts
Course Over Ground (COG): 307°
Time: 12:03:47 PM 4/23/17
Nautical miles to destination as a bird flies(Crs Rng & Brg): 215 nm Apparent wind speed (AWS): 6.1 kts
Apparent wind angle: Starboard 141°
