{"id":1306,"date":"2017-04-26T00:09:32","date_gmt":"2017-04-26T00:09:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/svslowflight.com\/?p=1306"},"modified":"2020-02-03T19:44:10","modified_gmt":"2020-02-03T19:44:10","slug":"the-crossing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/svslowflight.com\/index.php\/2017\/04\/26\/the-crossing\/","title":{"rendered":"The Crossing"},"content":{"rendered":"

Well, I just tried to upload photos but after 4 hours…. I only got a few to uplaod…I think I will give up. \u00a0I will add the other photos when we get better internet that is faster than 2G. \u00a0This is a short version since it is mostly text.<\/p>\n

Week 1<\/strong> – we left La Cruz Mexico on the morning of April 1st (April’s Fools Day, just in case we needed to turn around). \u00a0This day had another significance….Trevor proposed to me on April 1st 2004.<\/p>\n

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Leaving La Cruz, MX on 4-1-2017<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

We didn’t have much wind for the first week as we headed SW to reach the northern trade winds. Sails were flopping which created chafe on our lines and we had to replace some and fashion “chafe protection” as we saw fit.<\/p>\n

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Trevor making a temporary fix after we broke our mizzen boom sheet block.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

We also thought our hydro generator wasn’t working so we had to conserve energy aboard even more. This meant no GPS garmin on….really there is nothing out there. \u00a0We instead ran the auto pilot (ur third crew member) as it was more important.<\/p>\n

Our alternator also stopped producing power….Trevor installed our spare but that also died a day later. \u00a0We resorted to running our gen set to recharge our batteries for our night time power usage since our solar and wind kept up during the day.<\/p>\n

It took 3 or so days to get use to our schedules doing night shifts. \u00a0During the day whom ever was tired napped but at about 8-9 we would start our 3 hours on and off.<\/p>\n

We even saw a submarine…above water of course.<\/p>\n

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I know you can’t see it but though the bionoculars, there were only 1 level of lights with a single light 2\/3 back of the vessel….this was no cargo ship or cruise ship…looked like a submarine?!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

We were able to do laundry and sort our garbage. \u00a0Everything goes overboard expect for plastic. \u00a0We wash out our plastic and cut it up to save space.<\/p>\n

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Laundry day<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Garbage day<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Lots of visitors on the boat: squids, flying fish, and at one point we had 17 Brown footed boobies on our bow and anchor! \u00a0That was a lot of poop to clean up!<\/p>\n

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Trevor lines these guys up form the night before….he called it the Flying fishh Montesori school<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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There were more!!!! Others would literally land on top of each other, fall to the boat and hop on the second tier rail. there were 3-4 on the anchor just in from of the rails<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Week 2<\/strong> – We finally got into the trade winds, about 10-15 knots of wind from the NWish…this made our sail pattern a downwind sail. \u00a0Unlike conventional wisdom, sailing downwind for us is not very comfortable. \u00a0We fly wing on wing (jib one side and mail on the other, mizzen centered for steering).<\/p>\n

We stayed on this tack for days…the waves were 2 meters most days and the boat would rock and roll from side to side about 20 degrees every 12 seconds or so…..let’s just say we couldn’t stand without being assisted and hanging on to something.<\/p>\n

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Hard to capture but this piece of equipment tells us the degree we are heeling over to one side or the other….I once saw it hit 25-30<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

By the end of the week, I was going crazy as it was hard to DO anything but sit and watch…I actually took a valium at one point to reduce my argo attitude. Trevor was of course much better at handling the rocking but I think we both were ready for for another motion all together.<\/p>\n

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Tried to make brownies..epic fail<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

We hit a major squall….36 knots of wind, gusts up to over 40 knots and wave heights up to 20 feet. \u00a0Trevor had to hand steer for over 2 hours to steer through these waves and that left me to take down the mizzen sail in all of this. \u00a0We rolled in our jib and reefed our main sail but ripped it at the bottom due to our ducth-man system which helps flank the sails when we take it down….to say the least….we were drenched and it rained for 5 hours straight!<\/p>\n

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Da Squall<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Da Rain<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Saranwrapped the electronic to keep it dry<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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After math of the big squall…wind turbine lost that battle<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

After doing damage control, it was night time and we were exhausted. \u00a0On the bright side, the next day we hit the “duldrums”.<\/p>\n

Week 3<\/strong> – The duldrums – \u00a0The duldrums is generally near the equator (10-20 degrees north and south of the equator…and it moves around A LOT). \u00a0The seas calmed down and we motored though until we hit the equator.<\/p>\n

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The duldrums<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

We crossed the equator on Sunday Easter. \u00a0Trevor made me a Easter basket with cabbage as grass, a few slices of red onion for color. \u00a0He drew fun designs on hard boiled eggs and stuck one of our chocolate bars in it. \u00a0Super cute and wonderful to wake up to. \u00a0Our crossing ended up at about 10pm so we couldn’t jump into the water or anything fun like that but we made silly rabbit ears hats out of tin foil and a Neptune staff. \u00a0We popped open a bottle of champagne (one we got at a winery during last years Girls Wine Weekend in Yakima). \u00a0We toasted to Neptune and Trevor said a few words, offered Neptune some champagne and a few pesos from Mexico to keep him “happy”.<\/p>\n

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Our screen shot of our GPS at the equator<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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My easter basket<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Crossing dinner of fresh rolls…Trevor also made Butter Chicken with rice<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

We had about 5 days in the duldrums and got the boat back to semi-organized again, cleaned up a bit and we were glad we did that as the next few days were a bit rough.<\/p>\n

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Trevro fixing our hydro generator in the duldrums…becasue the weather was calm<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Week 4<\/strong> (3 days until landfall) – After the duldrums there the SE trade winds that take us WSW to the Marquesas Islands. \u00a0With these trades there is a “line” called the Monsoon trough…what I call “Squall city”.<\/p>\n

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You can see the squall coming…at least during the day. At night we had to use the radar to pick up the rain coming at us.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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It only gives you about 10 minutes or so to close hatches, drop sails…but still kind of pretty<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

These squalls move from east to west bringing clouds, wind and rain. \u00a0We basically played “dodge squall” but of course couldn’t escape them all. \u00a0One of them was 16 miles long…that one got us in the middle of the night! \u00a0We at least kind of knew what to expect since we went though a pretty rough one earlier but at night you can’t see a thing (the moon rose later and later in the evening since we left MX). \u00a0All was well but the squalls didn’t stop until literally we made landfall on April 23rd at about 8am local time here in French Polynesia.<\/p>\n

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Sun rise<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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sun set<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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moon rise<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

But we caught our first fish!!!! \u00a0And saw a HUGE pod of dolphins…<\/p>\n

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I luaghed at Trevor when he bought this fishing belt…now I understand why he got it. Moving at 7 knots under sail we couldn’t slow down.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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15-20 pound skip jack tuna<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Pod of dolphins…must of been 300 of them<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Landfall – We anchored out in the town Atuona on the island Hiva Oa in the bay on Sunday. \u00a0All the official offices are closed so we could not check in until Monday. \u00a0We stayed on our boat, since we had not passed customs or immigration and rested.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

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The island of Hiva Oa<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
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Kimi and Trevor selfie at anchor : )<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Stayed tuned for our island adventures….may be a while but we’ll get it out somehow : )<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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