Halfway...

Yes, folks that is more than halfway to Hilo! We are on the downhill side of the trip now. Well, I wish it was downhill but the seas have other ideas. As I write this, we just got toppled again as another “graybeard” came at us from a different angle.

Before this trip, I had only seen videos of the much feared “graybeards”. These are big ocean waves that have breakers at the top. With higher winds, the foam from the breakers spews off and creates white (gray) beards across the rest of the waves. Dramatic and a bit scary; but I have to admit we just kinda shrug our shoulders and now say - same old same old.

We are on Day 13 of the Odyssey. We have only run our motor about 20 minutes (yesterday; I’ll tell you the story below) in those 13 days. Salpare loves to sail and with Jeff trimming her sails just right we are making amazing time. We have another boat 400 miles ahead of us and Kris was beginning to get a bit competitive; wondering if we could catch them. You know what they say; two sailboats on any water heading in the same direction is a race!

Yesterday was exciting for two reasons. First we had a visitor! We have seen many Pacific White Sided Dolphins throughout the trip and I think they are thrilled to have this big white toy to splash and play with! There have been whales somewhere... but we would not be able to see them in these seas. So out flies a bird - a pretty big bird. Texting with my sister Mary Ann and Carolyn, we identified it as a Brown Boobie. For 10 minutes it was high drama with it trying to land on our spreaders(cross pieces on our mast). With us tumbling about, he would hit a stay or sail and I would shriek in horror and yell guidance to it; very stressful! Finally, he learned to land on the outer tip of the lower spreader then slide down it when we heeled and bonk in to the mast. There he would huddle and rest. Later, he hopped down to our spinnaker sail bag, tucked his head under his wing and slept through the night; waves drenching him, winds blowing him and the boat heeling under him. We named him Sula; that is his genus. Jeff and others through texting found many other names for him that related to his common name. Think chocolate and breasts and you get the idea.

The next morning, the winds had died down and I went forward to shake out the #2 reef (this is how we shorten our sail in big winds - we reef it). Sula awoke and stood inches next to me and was very inquisitive about what I was doing. However, everything was about to change... The bolt that holds the boom to the mast had worked its way out and the boom was free hanging by the halyards! For those of you who are not sailors - THIS IS NOT GOOD. The boom should always be attached! Luckily, I looked down and there was the bolt.

We all sprang in to action; insure no lines are in the water, start engine, dowse sails, rig halyards and sheets to maneuver the heavy boom around, get tools etc... within 90 minutes we had it fixed and cleaned up some other rigging issues that would have popped up eventually. Very exciting - ok I would not call it that at all!

Are you wondering what Sula was doing throughout this? Once we sprang in to action; he flew the coop. I’m pretty sure he wanted to get away from these crazy-ass humans.

We also setup our generator station and Salpare Gas Station. We had been pulling out the generator and fuel when needed and moving the life raft etc... Really tough and a bit dangerous in these rolly seas to be moving heavy items. You could fall and get hurt or break the beloved Garmin chart plotter or worst of all - bleed on my boat! So the aft lazerette seats now hold the generator and its accouterments all tied down and secure. Makes our life a lot easier!

We get information about what is happening at home in regards to Covid. Not even sure if I’m using the correct terminology when I write this. When we learned that Century Link Field is being turned into a field hospital we just sat in dazed silence. Struggling to understand what all of you are going through and wrap our minds around this new world. We still don’t know what lies ahead of us with clearing in to Hawaii. At this point, I don’t mind any additional quarantine/isolation as it keeps us away from everyone. Not exactly the normal response from folks who will have been at sea for almost a month. We have 3 boats ahead of us who will let us know the status in Hilo.

We think of our family and friends on land all the time and send love and strength,

Fran, Jeff and Kris