Worrall Wind Update - Day 7 to Suwarrow

UTC/Local Time: Wednesday, August 25 0200/Tuesday, August 24 1600

Latitude: 13 27.081 S
Longitude: 162 01.507 W

Course Over Ground: 285 @ 4 knots
Wind Direction: E 88, <14 knots
Sea Swell: 2 meter swells ENE
Sky: 80%
Barometric Pressure: 1013
Temperature: 85 degrees
Humidity: 68 percent

Update: Day 7 to Suwarrow, 60 miles out

Yesterday was another lovely sailing day. The winds and sea conditions were remarkably calm and pleasant. A couple of squalls passed by to our starboard side a few times helping our speed to accelerate which was a bonus. We had already decided to slow our speed down so as not arrive in Suwarriw until the morning of August 25. But the winds were so light that there were times when our calculator started to estimate an arrival of two days later than that. We wanted slow, but not that slow. Are we never happy?

By dusk, the moon was rising and there were clouds building behind us indicating that we might be in for squally evening. For no apparent reason that we could see, the north east swell was building in size and frequency. The wind was still pretty light which means that the boat with her reduced sail begins to roll more as there is less counter wind pressure to keep her heeled. The Honda generator that had purring along for the afternoon was beginning to need more starts as its kill switch kept doing what it was supposed to. Russ had tried to find and disable the kill switch earlier in the day and finally decided it must be a float in the gas tank, as it was not electronic as he had hoped. Oh well. He is very patient, and each time Honda would die, he would start it up again.

We sat on the bow absorbing the magnificent beauty of the evening sky. The moon cast a golden ribbon of undulating satin from the horizon across the sea right to the stern of our boat. Moonlight sails are absolutely the best. After the nets were over and the sails readied for the night, Russ went to bed. I promised to tend Honda, but am not as patient as Russ. After donning my life jacket, clipping in, making my way to the fan tail, waiting for the seas to calm down, and starting the generator at least 12 time within 1 hour (that's every 5 minutes of big beam rollers), I had enough already! It was almost midnight and Russ would be up in a couple of hours. If it was still rolly and we needed power, we could turn on the motor.

Night watch was uneventful. Russ's was too, with the exception of the continuous rolls. And once Russ was up he started the generator. When I got up, there was a weather front starting to creep up behind us. We could see the grey sky and dark clouds on our starboard side. It took several hours to pass us by. By noon we were clocking winds of 25 knots and were moving between 6 and 7 knots reefed. The rollers didn't seem nearly so bad with wind in our sails. As the afternoon wore on, more blue started to show, the winds died down, and we were back to rocking and rolling. The cloud cover and light winds meant that Honda had to come back on.

Russ is napping and asked that I keep Honda running. He can sit outside for hours starting it every time it stops. He said he propped it up and should stay on. "Ok, but if I have to keep pulling that string more than six times, I'm done." Well, I didn't even last that long. After I had pulled the string 3 times in 10 minutes I was sooo done.   Even propped up on the rolliest of sides, the darn thing just doesn't like working when the boat is rolling, and I could see a train of swells coming for miles. The wind was starting to shift around, and I had other things to tend to like keeping the boat on course and preventing the sails from back winding.

When we get to Suwarrow, Russ hopes to give Hydie a temporary fix until we reach Samoa. He bought some sort of universal bolt material that he used to fix the gooseneck that he thinks might work for Hydie's bottom strut. So we are keeping our fingers crossed that a temporary fix will allow Ray to rest and stop consuming so much energy, and we can put Honda to bed.
We are now only sixty miles from Suwarriw and should arrive sometime tomorrow morning. Gene and Gloria on Pincoya were trying to get there by this afternoon, but after the light and variable winds and rolling seas, they weren't comfortable with their gennaker flying through the night, so they too reduced sail and are planning on arriving tomorrow morning as well. They were about 30 miles ahead of us this morning, so they will most likely heave too outside the for the pre dawn hours.

Tomorrow night, we look forward to being on anchor and getting a full night sleep in our bedroom.

All is well on Worrall Wind.