Two Fish - Day 37 - Half way to Galapagos

We are officially in offshore passage rhythm. 2 hours of "on watch" followed by six hours "off watch" is the plan. Reality works out to something different. Mike and Rebecca often share their watches while I will often do the bulk of Gail's night watches and she does the bulk of my day watches. Our bodies are used to being jiggled, we walk naturally like penguins and hold on to the boat at all times. We enjoying chatting when a crowd forms in the cockpit but also appreciate the silence of standing a solo watch. The boat and the sea set the tempo. Sometimes life is very slow and patience is required. We spent a night coasting in light air with twin head sails pulling us along. While other times one is very busy. My heart rate races with the physical effort of a full sail change. Chute down. Boat head to wind. Full Main up. Screecher deployed. Clean up lines. Head back to the bunk. Did I reef too early? Is the wind light enough for the chute? Will there be a large wind shift? Books are read, music listened to and radio chats with other rally boats.

I enjoy watching the birds coasting inches above the water as they hunt for fish. Mike and Rebecca are also keen fishermen and they caught 4 yellow fin tuna in 24 hours. The fishing rods are stowed and we will gorge on fresh fish for the next two days. Galapagos customs will not allow us to bring in caught fish so the choices are eat it or loose it. I choose eat it. How is tuna on cereal?

The bigger boats are thinking about arriving in the Galapagos but we still have 2 more nights at sea. Rally boats are asked to use a stern anchor to fit the large quantity of participant boats. Nicely the water taxis will help deploy your stern anchor, what a deluxe service. I think the rally organizers oversold the rally. A smaller number of boats would make the rendez vous anchorages less complicated. However, the pacific ocean is huge so there is plenty of room for all 32 boats.

I will watch a Galapagos related documentary tonight unless Two Fish needs a bunch of sail changes. I write this while the water maker is producing 25 gallons per hour. With 4 people aboard we use about 20 gallons a day. Our batteries also need charging so it is two tanks with one generator?

Here is an example of one of the many sailing puzzles we had to solve now we are going downwind. Downwind was a rarity in the eastern Caribbean.
True wind speed of 10 knots and true wind angle of 180 (dead down wind). We had twin heads sails of chute (pink stink) and screecher(black fish). This rig works well in 12 knots or more but as the breeze dropped to 8 to 10 knots both sails shook on every wave and the boat was frustrating to steer and slow. Our solution was to drop screecher and steered TWA (true wind angle) of 135-140. Boat moved very well under only the chute. We were much faster with just one sail that with two. This faster speed takes into account the fact we were sailing off course. We were able to sail the whole night while many near by boats were motoring. We actually kept pace with them.


Jason
www.twofishcat.com