It is again another day at sea and it can become a little more difficult for to determine of what to write that may be interesting. For instance, we watched our entire stalk of bananas turn yellow today; this is pretty exciting stuff huh? Well it was a little bit so for us because usually the stalk of bananas ripens on one end first and then progresses down the stalk over four days and you thus find yourself trying to eat and find things to do with over a hundred bananas over four or five days. But we learned of a solution, for we were told by an Islander that if we covered the stalk of bananas with cloth or some type of material, the process of turning yellow would be slowed, and indeed this did work for us. We had about 8 bananas begin to turn yellow each of the last two days, but unfortunately today the whole remaining stalk went yellow. Maybe it is instead better to cover the bananas only once a few start to turn yellow? So the next time you, you being our friends, family and other listeners, cut down a stalk of bananas keep in mind that to immediately cover the entire stalk of hanging bananas may not be a viable solution. Wow, where can today’s report go after this exciting banana discussion? You would think things could only get better, but no promises here today. We made a huge pot of spaghetti for lunch and dinner with enough left over for tomorrow. And we cooked the pasta in a pressure cooker given to us by Wade’s mother, and while pressure cookers may seem old school, we cannot believe how much we use this thing, like we almost now find our life difficult to imagine without such a pressure cooker. For pasta, it only takes an unbelievable 6 minutes for it to make perfect pasta once the inside reaches boiling temperature; try that on a pot on a stove top. And because of our excess solar power, we have free energy for to run this electric pressure cooker, which it seems that we use almost every other day for things like rice, roasts, octopus, barbecue and so on. Today we also looked over our Lonely Planet book on Alaska for to try to determine what to see there and at a what times to visit various places throughout the season. To further describe our day, Sara went to sleep last night at 8 pm, Wade kept watch until 2 am when he woke Sara for her watch, and then Wade awoke around 8:00 am, and that was our sleep except for a nap. But the most exciting thing is that during the night the wind came. A nice breeze that blew about 13 to 16 knots, gusting sometimes to 19 knots. And because of the wind being about 70 degrees off the bow, we started to sail fast, probably averaging 7.5 knots over the day, and the weather shows no signs of this wind letting up, rather it will still increase a bit over the next few days. Not that we want more wind as we are already sailing with reefed sails. And 7.5 knots, or about 9 miles an hour may not seem fast, but it is a good pace for a cruising sailboat, plus we have experienced lengthy times in the 8 knot range, sometimes reaching 9 knots. Anyways, to summarize, our bellies are pleasantly full, we are rested, we now are moving along at a fast pace towards Hawaii and doing so solely under wind power, and we have about a 150 ripe bananas to eat. All in all, a good day at sea.
Cheers,
Wade and Sara
Math Be Hard For Sailors – Hawaiian Islands
Destination: Hawaiian Islands (19°15.545’S, 154°31.747’W) Prize: Hawaiian post card from us to you and a black pearl with shell Submissions are accepted until 4/17/16.
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 clear.
Ves. Pos. 08°11,511’S, 142°42.207’W
SOG: 5.8 kts The low speed was because the screen print was captured at the same time we plowed into a large wave that temporarily slowed us up. Course Over Ground (COG): 335°
Time: 12:01:33 PM 4/17/17
Nautical miles to destination as a bird flies(Crs Rng & Brg): 958 nm
Compass degree required to reach destination as a bird flies (Crs Rng & Brg): 315° Apparent wind speed (AWS): 16.8 kts
Apparent wind angle: Starboard 61°
