Brian's Back Blog

August 8-23, 2010, 13:20 HST

2010-08-29T18:50:00.000-07:00

N 45°21.702’, W 136°27.261’
Heading Home...Part II

Okay, so it’s been a while since I’ve posted a blog entry but believe me, there’s not a whole lot to report at this point. Here’s a day by day rundown of the mostly boring events that have transpired since the last time I posted (pictures are pretty much random):

August 8th: I thought my iPod succumbed to the harsh salt water environment as it wasn’t functioning properly. At that time, night watches officially began to suck for me.

August 9th: Today I lost two lures while fishing, both of them lost with fish on. One of the fish actually jumped out of the water once it was hooked and it looked like a wahoo (ono) from my vantage point on the stern of the boat.

August 10th: The weather faxes are starting to look grim which means that our return passage may take much more time than we initially anticipated. Richard is now checking for updates twice a day with the hopes that maybe, hopefully, things will change quickly. Meanwhile, I’m trying to figure out the best plan for rationing our food and getting anxious that I haven’t hooked into a fish yet.

August 11th: In Lahaina, I picked up a book titled Fornander’s Ancient History of the Hawaiian People to the Times of Kamehameha I. The book is basically a genealogical history of the chiefs and chiefesses of the Hawaiian Islands beginning after the initial migratory period of Polynesians up to about the mid-nineteenth century. The author, who lived during the latter part of this epic and was married to a Hawaiian chiefess himself, laid out all the important battles in that period that shaped the political boundaries of the individual island kingdoms which eventually were united under Kamehameha I in the mid-nineteenth century. It took me a long time to read this book; I actually started reading it on July 16th but each character’s name became a stumbling block not being fluent n Hawaiian. Given the tone of the book, if Kamehameha had not been successful in uniting all of the Hawaiian islands into one kingdom, it sounds like the chiefs might still be feuding to this day.

A Very Short, One Act Play…
Richard: You stink.
Brian: I’ll bathe at 2:30.
The End.

I had to put long pants on today for the first time since before arriving in Hilo weeks ago.

I started reading Eclipse, by Stephanie Meyer; my friend Carol is moaning in disgust because she and I both adamantly believe that friends don’t let friends read Twilight sequels.

August 12th: Richard is now saying that it will definitely take longer to get home than initially planned. The days and nights are getting somewhat cooler, necessitating pants (is this a turning point?).

I have been “going to the gym” every day since we left Hanalei. My routine includes the following exercises (25 repetitions x 2 sets: dips, sit ups, push ups, bicycle sit ups, bicep curls (with resistance band), seated row (with resistance band), and standing pec fly (with resistance band). I am determined to lose all the weight I gained by eating out for the past month while in the islands!

It’s been getting light out at about 4:20 am each day.

August 13th: Finished Eclipse (CY, only one more to go! HA!). Began reading An Arsonist’s Guide to Writers’ Homes in New England by Brock Clarke.

August 14th: HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

August 15th: Finished An Arsonist’s Guide to Writers’ Homes in New England; began reading All Fishermen Are Liars by Linda Greenlaw.

August 16th: Finished All Fishermen Are Liars; began reading The Big Burn by Timothy Eagan.

We have not had any usable wind in the past few days and this has become quite disconcerting. Richard and I have been discussing ways to make food, water and fuel last. I still have yet to hook into a fish on this return passage and that is getting kind of frustrating. Richard fixed (again?) the water pressure issue. I have a persistent low-grade, background headache every day and I think it’s related to the swells and all the rocking the boat is doing…kind of annoying. The days are still warm but by suppertime the temperature is quite chilly and nights are downright cold.

August 18th: Today I had to don my snorkel mask and swim under the boat on the suspicion that there might be something stuck on the propeller (like discarded line or something equally evil). There wasn’t but I did get to see these neat little black and beige fish that have been swimming with the boat for a while now. I think they use the boat as some sort of protection or cover from the larger predatory fish in the area. Not sure if they understand that if they hitchhike all the way with us that they will end up in the cold waters of the Pacific Northwest…their decision.

A cotter pin holding a shackle on the main sheet at the traveler track broke loose today. Took us a while to get that fixed but luckily we had a spare shackle on board.

August 19th: Fish on! I was down below sleeping and Richard got to yell my favorite fishing phrase. This tuna was a bit smaller than the one I caught on the way to Hawai’i but will be enjoyed just the same.

August 20th: Today I discovered that my iPod is not toast; it’s just that my earbuds have loose wires…night watches no longer officially suck.

August 21st: Finished The Big Burn. I have completely run out of books to read on board; good thing my iPod is working again!

August 22nd-23rd: We finally got some decent wind and have been able to sail and make head way towards Anacortes…Finally! It is a bumpy ride which makes everything we try to do on board difficult.

There you have it, all the boring details of life aboard Osprey on the homeward passage. I’m hoping that we are only about one more week until pulling into our slip in Anacortes. It will be good to get back on terra firma, see friends and family and sit back and reflect on this amazing journey.

August 8, 2010, 12:44 HST

2010-08-29T18:03:00.000-07:00

N 29°12.530’, W 158°00.480’
Heading Home...Part I

The past five days have been filled with blue skies, a very blue ocean, periodic squalls, high temperatures, and a missed mahimahi. We are back on a three hours on/three hours off watch schedule and for the most part, both Richard and I have settled into this routine. What is surprising, at least to me, is that we are both still taking scopace despite being at sea for over five days. I would have thought that the initial effects of the rolling ocean swells would have been absorbed by now but that hasn’t been the case. Good thing we have a robust supply of scopace for this trip.

Each day is pretty much the same as the last one…blue skies, puffy white clouds, occasional afternoon rain storms (or, as I like to refer to them, bath time!), and a very blue ocean. At night, there tend to be more squalls (which I don’t refer to as bath time) and higher winds. In addition to having started this passage on a waning moon, the moon has been rising late in the evening (it’s actually been rising around 03:00 in the morning) which makes the night watches quite dark; the bonus to this dark night time sky is that the stars, constellations, the edge of the Milky Way, planets, shooting stars and comets are easily visible. During one of my three hour watches, I counted 11 shooting stars and 2 comets. The usual suspects of constellations, like the Big Dipper, Orion, the Pleides, Scorpio, and Sirius, are plainly visible and welcomed company during the night. We do have star gazing equipment on board and maybe one of these nights I’ll take that out to see if I can identify what the other constellations and planets are that fill the night sky.

The temperature has been very tropical, with daytime highs reaching well into the high 80s and mid 90s. Since we are sailing, we can’t have any of the screens in the portholes or the hatches open for ventilation, so the cabin is also quite warm and humid. This makes sleeping, at least for me, rather difficult.

Yesterday I hooked a mahimahi but as we got him to the boat, the line snapped and off he went with my lure stuck in his mouth. We are on a different tack on this return passage and so netting a fish on the side of the boat is a little more tricky than when we were heading to Hawai’i on a downwind tack. For the most part we are on a starboard tack which means that the port side of the boat is slightly lower than the starboard side due to the heel of the boat while sailing. As this is the more convenient side of the boat to fish from, Richard and I will have to devise a plan on how we will bring the fish to the boat so that one of us can net it successfully. I will make sure to let you all know how that works out once we have our next opportunity.

August 4, 2010, 08:00 HST

2010-08-04T10:59:00.000-07:00

N 22°12.658’, W 159°30.097’
Hanalei Bay, Kaua’i…Heading North…

Woke up this morning and realized that it’s our last day in Hawai’i. I know that I’m not going to get any sympathy from anyone when I say that I’m sad to leave (given that we’ve been here just about a month). This morning will be spent making final preparations before we raise the anchor and head North into the Pacific Ocean for the passage home. We will not have cell phone or email as soon as we get offshore so this will be the last blog entry for this site. The regular blog, however, will continue to have updates as we travel to the Pacific Northwest, and pictures will be uploaded once we make landfall in Anacortes. I will update this blog as well once we are back in our slip in Washington.

Aloha and Mahalo for keeping up with us via out blogs!

August 2, 2010, 20:00 HST

2010-08-04T10:20:00.000-07:00

N 22°12.658’, W 159°30.097’
Hanalei Bay, Kaua’i…Nearing the end…

It’s the night before our last night in Hanalei Bay and I am definitely sad to have to be leaving. Granted, Hanalei Bay isn’t perfect; just near perfect. The natural beauty is spectacular with the near two mile long crescent of golden sand beach fringed by palm trees, backed by lush green mountains. And remember all the rain I blogged about? Well, all that rain fed a number of waterfalls that cascaded down the faces of the ridge that reached out towards the ocean. And the rain always came with the sun so you had rainbows nearly every day. The bay itself was also amazing. The colors of the water, from deep true blue to aqua to turquoise to cerulean, it never ceased to amaze me that the water could take on so many different hues. The sunrises and sunsets against the mountains and over the ocean, dolphins swimming in and out of the bay, and the sea life teaming below the surface.

The Hanalei River is also beautiful and Richard and I got to experience that firsthand when we kayaked as far up the river as we could before running out of depth to proceed further. Lined with coconut palms and banana trees, narrowing to just a few meters wide at spots, the Hanalei River was both peaceful and full of wild life. We saw numerous species of birds, fish and a few painted box turtles along the way. Where the river meets the bay, a spit of sand juts out protecting the peaceful little cove at the river’s end from the surf created by the endless ocean swells.

The town of Hanalei is both sleepy and vibrant. It’s simple in its presentation and doesn’t offer too many choices as to be seen as overwhelming while at the same time providing just the right amount of diversity to please a variety of palates. The laid back shop keepers and restaurant workers extend “aloha” genuinely and really seem happy to meet you, even if your time in Hanalei is brief. I could really see myself settling down here for a while and liking it. I mean how could you not like it? You could surf, hike, paddle, snorkel, swim, sail, pedal, eat, drink and be merry in the most perfect surroundings; you might have to work a bit here and there but let’s be realistic, even perfection has its logical limits.

But like I said, Hanalei is not perfect. Hanalei Bay’s northern exposure to the ocean allows swells to enter the bay and while the day time winds help keep the boat fairly steady, from sunset to sunrise you are a rockin’ and a rollin’! Believe me, after a while, even in paradise, this tends to get on your nerves. Breakfast is a comedy of watching your juice glass and tea cup slide back and forth on the table while you try to keep the butter, sugar, maple syrup, cereal bowls, plates, etc. from sliding off as well.

But from a cruiser’s perspective, the holding is firm in sand, there’s plenty of room for lots of boats (currently 20+ sailing vessels with just as many motor boats of various sizes), not to mention the oodles of kayakers, paddlers, and surfers you have to dodge when taking your dinghy to shore; and the shore is easily accessible by dinghy where there’s fresh water and outdoor showers. In addition, you can rent kayaks, paddle boards, and surf boards right on shore, and bikes and mopeds in town which is just a 15-20 minute walk from shore. The grocery store is actually more provisioned that most of the guide books give it credit (the one we used said that it stocked “basics”, but we found it to have just about everything a cruising boat could want, including ice!). Propane is a bit of an adventure to procure as you have to go to the nearest gas station which is in Princeville and without a car, a taxi is the only way to get this done as you cannot take flammable liquids on the buses. Speaking of the buses, while we didn’t take the buses anywhere, the system runs clockwise from the North Shore to the West side of the island and allows you to access most of what the island has to offer. If Kaua’i were a clock, basically between 8:00 and 11:00 is not accessible or served by any roads. This is the Na Pali coast and the lack of easy access is probably the only thing that has saved this incredible natural area from over exposure.

So yea, let’s just say that I really liked Hanalei Bay, even if it wasn’t perfect. I can’t wait to come back.

And here comes the rain again.

August 1, 2010, 22:14 HST

2010-08-02T13:58:00.000-07:00

N 22°12.658’, W 159°30.097’
Hanalei Bay, Kaua’i…Paradise, revisited…

Today was another day where we did virtually nothing…and it was great! I woke up without the searing pain from the stinging hydroids so that was a bonus. It rained off and on all day long which made sitting in the cockpit and watching the dolphins, paddle boarders, kayakers and surfers all the more appropriate. I honestly remember sitting in the cockpit after breakfast, taking in the sights, and all of a sudden realizing it was lunchtime and shortly after that, it was dinner time! These last few days seem to be flying by and that’s making me a bit sad.

We went into town and ate dinner at Hanalei Gourmet. Initially it looked like there might be a wait but Amy, the bartender from the night before, was sitting on this side of the bar and motioned over to us, pointing to two seats at the bar. We strolled over and took our places at the bar and thanked Amy. Amy’s husband, Pepe, showed up and Amy told him of our upcoming departure and how we planned to fish along the way. I asked Pepe about fishing opportunities in Hawaiian waters and told him of my skepticism surrounding the warm water temperatures. Pepe assured me that yellowtail tuna, wahoo, and mahi mahi love the warm waters surrounding Hawai’i and all I had to do was put out a line with a squid lure on and I would soon find myself with plenty of fish. I told him I would take his advice and hope for the best. Before he and Amy left, Pepe took out his cell phone to show me a picture of a 600+ pound marlin that a bud of his just caught earlier in the day outside of Anahola on the eastside of Kaua’i. It was a monster!

The Mango Brothers, a local guitar and ukelele band, were providing the musical backdrop at Hanalei Gourmet while we were having dinner. They played Hawaiian music as well as some Hawaiian versions of "somewhat" contemporary tunes. They even had some hula girls come out for a couple of songs. It was fun to listen to live, local music. The vibe was definitely North Shore!

Amy made sure to let us know that she would be DJing tomorrow on a local radio station between 3pm and 5 pm. She goes by the name of DJ Diamond and, according to Amy, plays “girlie music!” We told her we would tune in if we were on the boat.

On our way back to the boat we noticed that the mooring ball we had beached the other day was gone.

The Coconut...Part II

July 31, 2010, 20:16 HST

2010-08-02T12:57:00.000-07:00

N 22°12.658’, W 159°30.097’
Hanalei Bay, Kaua’i…Paradise, with a few kinks…
Today Richard and I went to the Hanalei farmers’ market and for the most part had a good time. It was located in a field behind the Hanalei Poi Company, adjacent to the taro fields. There were booths with organic farmers there selling papayas, bananas, mangoes, various vegetables, honey and other great stuff. There were also booths present with artisans selling koa wood carved bowls, sea glass and shell jewelry, and local goat cheese. In addition to these booths, there were also booths selling tie-dyed shirts (made in Honduras), straw hats (made in China), and other things that were neither made in Hawai’i nor made by farmers. I mean, isn’t the operative word here farmers? While I don’t mind so much the vendors selling "made in Hawai’i" goods at a Hawaiian farmers market, I do mind vendors who are selling crap made outside of the United States. Now, I will be the first to admit that I’m not as vigilant as I should be about buying locally, and this is something that I have told myself that I need to be more aware of moving forward. But check this out…there you are in Hawai’i and you want to buy a souvenir. So you see that coconut shell with the painted sunset on it and you think, “Oh, that’ll look great on the mantle!” So you pick up the painted coconut, turn it over and find a “Made in China” sticker on it. How is that a souvenir from Hawai’i? Then we wonder why so many people are out of work; nothing is made in America any more! PS...nothing painted on a coconut shell would look good on your mantle.

But I think I’m getting a nose-bleed standing up on my soap box so I’ll step down now.

We did buy some papayas and Richard bought a coconut from this guy standing at the back of an old truck wielding a machete. The deal is you buy the coconut, the guy hacks off one end of the shell exposing a small patch of the inner shell. He then takes a bore-like tool and makes a small hole in the shell so you can stick a straw in to drink the coconut water. You drink the water, bring the coconut back to the machete-wielding guy and he splits the coconut in half and uses a special tool to scoop the coconut meat loose. The coconut water and meat were a little too “green” for my tastes, but the whole “eating as coconut in paradise” experience worked for me nonetheless. Check out the video below of Richard getting us a coconut.

Behind the Hanalei Poi Company building we spotted a small flock of Nene's, the Hawaiian state bird.

We returned to the boat for an afternoon of sitting in the cockpit, watching dolphins swim by, and swimming around the boat. At one point I noticed a red ball floating by the boat. We decided that it was a mooring ball so I donned my mask, snorkel and fins and headed out to recover it; it was only about 100 or so feet from the boat. Once I reached the mooring ball, I looked down the line expecting to see it free floating but instead I saw a cinder block attached to the working end of the line suspended in about 50 feet of water. Despite the oddity of seeing the cinder block, I grabbed the line and started swimming back to the boat. Back at the boat, Richard and I decided to ask our neighbors if they had any ideas what we should do with the mooring ball (our neighbors are kind of “local”). Richard tried to lift the mooring ball and line into the dinghy, but the weight of the hanging cinder block made it kind of difficult so I dove down and tried lifting the cinder block up towards the dinghy. It was damn heavy! We finally got the mooring ball and cinder block into the dinghy and motored over to our neighbor’s boat. After talking to them, we decided to beach the mooring ball on a spit where the Hanalei River meets Hanalei Bay, figuring is someone came looking for his/her mooring ball in the bay and didn’t see it, maybe he/she would spot it on shore.

Having dropped off the mooring ball on the spit, we were heading back to our boat when I noticed that my neck was starting to burn. I immediately thought, “Great! I’ve got a sunburn on my neck and I’ll never hear the end of it for not putting on sunblock.” When we finally reached the boat, the burning in my neck was intensified. I went into the head (aka bathroom) to look in the mirror but couldn’t see anything on my neck. I asked Richard to look at my neck and he asked me why. “Because I have a searing hot pain on my neck and face,” I said. It felt like someone was grinding white-hot broken glass into my neck and face. We quickly looked up these symptoms in our medical reference and discovered the wonderfully horrible world of stinging hydroids.

Stinging hydroids are plant-like creatures, related to jellyfish, that are described as “beautiful, fan-like creatures that pack a painful sting." Great! What happens is that when the water is turbulent, pieces of the hydroids, that are usually attached to rocks, coral, mooring lines (hmmm?), etc., break off and become random, microscopic missiles of pain floating around in the water…the same water that we’ve been swimming in for the past few days.

We fired up the laptop and googled “stinging hydroids treatments” and found a plethora of articles. The treatment involves an acidic compress (vinegar on a face cloth) for about 30 minutes followed by application of hydrocortisone cream; special emphasis was placed on not applying fresh water as this might re-activate any remaining nematocysts on the skin resulting in more searing pain. Richard commented that I would smell like a pickle for the rest of the night and that was fine with me.

After this minor crisis was averted, we got ready and went to a luau. This luau was being put on by the Hanalei Canoe Club Youth Programs, so we imagined that it would be less cheesy than a luau put on by a chain hotel. In fact, it was better than one of those cheesy luaus. The food was good, though we both thought that they could have put a little more on our plates. Richard and I both enjoyed the poi!

Having finished our plates, and still hungry, we decided to walk into town to get something else to eat. We ended up at Hanalei Gourmet and had a great plate of smoked local fish (marlin) and beers. We followed that up with some ice cream and walked back to the boat.

Just another day in paradise…with a few kinks thrown in for good measure.

The Coconut...Part I

July 28-30, 2010, 17:06 HST

2010-07-30T23:58:00.000-07:00

N 22°12.658’, W 159°30.097’
Hanalei Bay, Kaua’i…Paradise re-defined…

Kaua’i has been nothing short of amazing and I'm not sure I ever want to leave. Those of you who say, "Oh, you'll get 'island fever' and want to leave soon enough,"...you must be going about it the wrong way that's all I can say and I'll drink to that!

Richard and I were here in 2004 as land-based tourists and it’s a completely different ballgame from the perspective of boaters. As land-based tourists, your focus is on activities, souvenirs and postcards. As a boater, you’re still interested in activities, but activities that are accessible from your boat. In addition, you have to substitute procuring fresh water and propane for souvenirs and postcards. As described earlier, provisioning, something you don’t have to do as a land-based tourist, is something that requires a fair amount of forethought, good walking shoes, a backpack, and preferably, a day when the temperature isn’t hitting a record high.

On Wednesday the 28th we did absolutely nothing. Nada. We basically sat around the boat all day trying to get motivated to do something but nothing materialized. Okay, so we did swim around the boat a bit and watch dolphins swimming in the distance, but nothing really substantial. The one thing we did do was figure out that we didn’t have to drag the dinghy up the beach if we anchored it in the Hanalei River. Later, we dinghied to shore and went to dinner at a place called Postcards Café…if you’re ever in Hanalei, or have a car and are on the island of Kaua’i, I would recommend going to this restaurant. The fish is fresh, the menu is small but robust, and the service is attentive (not overly, just right).

Yesterday we rented kayaks and kayaked up the Hanalei River. The round trip took us just under three hours and the scenery was incredible. At first, you have the Namolokama Mountains in the background which gives way to fields of banana and coconut trees as the river gets narrower and the banks of the river close in on you and your kayak.

Eventually, we reached a narrow section where the water was less than a foot deep and we would have had to carry our kayaks over the rocky riverbed to a deeper section if we had wanted to continue upstream. We decided to turn around and head back downstream. I thought this would have been easier than going upstream, as the wind had been on our nose going upstream; but, wouldn’t you know it, the wind changed direction and for part of the way back, the wind was on our nose again! Oh well, the scenery was beautiful and we saw lots of fish and a couple of fresh water painted turtles.

By the time we got back to the boat we were both a little tired from this upper-body workout. I decided to balance this activity out by snorkeling around the boat and Hanalei Bay. Didn’t see much in terms of reef fish as there is only a small coral reef in the bay proper; but it was a good lower-body workout which I’m sure my personal trainer would have approved of if he were around to comment on my lack of commitment to fitness on this trip.

We went back into town and ate at a Brazilian restaurant which was kind of bland and nothing special in my book. When we got to the dinghy, conveniently anchored in the river, there were lots of people lined up along the shore to watch the sunset. Just as Richard was turning the dinghy around to face it towards the river for us to head out, I heard someone behind me comment on the “green flash.” Remembering something about a “green flash” from one of the tour books, I instinctively looked towards the sunset just in time to see this natural phenomenon. If you’ve never seen it before, it really is a flash of green light just as the sun dips below the horizon. Richard missed it and I told him that we couldn’t leave Kaua’i until he has seen it. I plan to be VERY distracting for a while, especially around sunset!

This morning I had to call my new manager from work to enlist her help in locating a missing paycheck and while I was on the phone with her a sea turtle surfaced off the boat’s stern. It looked to be pretty big but was not close enough for a photo op. I guess that means we have to stay in Hawai’i until I get a close up photo. If you want to see a good photo of a sea turtle, visit S/V Mist. Susan and Elba snapped a great picture of a sea turtle swimming beside their boat (I've got turtle envy!).

After breakfast we dinghied to shore and rented paddle boards. I don’t remember this being such a fad the last time we were in Hawai’i, but apparently it is now. Paddle boarding involves a slightly larger surfboard that you stand on and, as the name implies, paddle with a long-handled oar. We practiced in the river where the water was relatively calm, although the wind had picked up some making it a bit difficult, and then headed out into the bay. As you can imagine, the portion of the bay where the river empties into it is often a bit turbulent with the river flowing out and the open ocean waves opposing the river’s flow. We made it out and paddled around the bay some before the wind really picked up making it even harder to maneuver. I tried to surf with my paddle board, but instead of laying flat on the board and paddling with my hands, I stood and tried to paddle my way up the face of the waves with the oar. Let’s just leave it at I was not successful.

As this was another upper-body workout, I again went out snorkeling after lunch to balance out my “gym routine.” This time I swam over to where the river flows into the bay as there is a rocky point that juts out some and it looked to me like there was also a reef in this area. For the most part, it was coral this, coral that, small little fish like Nemo's cousin or something, rocks, waves, opps! watch out for that boat! and then I struck gold! In an outcropping of coral, lurking near a small opening in the coral, I spotted the Hawaiian state fish, the humuhumunukunukuapua'a, not once, but twice! I’m pretty sure it was the same fish that I saw going in and coming out of the reef. The common name for this fish is the Picasso Triggerfish and the Hawaiian name means something like "nesting fish with the nose of a pig." It apparently grunts like a pig when taken out of the water; a fact I learned not by doing but by reading in my Pocket Guide to Hawaiian Fish. BTW…spell-check is having a field day with the fish name! I do not take credit for this photo; Google image Internet search result.

Richard grilled steaks on the boat tonight as we attempt to curb both our dining out expenses and caloric intake.

July 26-27, 2010, 20:15 HST

2010-07-30T23:07:00.000-07:00

N 22°12.658’, W 159°30.097’
Hanalei Bay, Kaua’i…I’m not sure it gets any better than this…

The overnight passage from Honolulu to Hanalei Bay was full of notable events. First off, we had great winds for most of the trip and were able to sail the entire way. We had winds out of the NE and E in the range of 15-24 knots; however, there were some pretty big waves associated with these winds but for the most part, this wasn’t too bad of a problem.

At N 21°19.11’, W 158°17.59’ we were approached by a high-speed inflatable dinghy. The boat came cruising out from the distance, sped behind our boat, then pulled up parallel to Osprey about 100 feet off of the starboard side of the boat. One of the guys in the boat yelled over to us that we had to be “8,000 yards that way” pointing south, without any further explanation. He repeated this demand and then sped off. I have to admit that I was somewhat taken aback by the lack of official-ness this boat had and the demands that were being placed on our boat. The charts did indicate that we were in a military practice zone (submarines, target practice, something like that, no, seriously, we were aware of this and had taken this caution seriously), and we had plotted our route with this in mind. After the boat left, we started looking at what exactly “8,000 yards that way” would look like with respect to our route to Kaua’i and actually started off in this new direction. This didn’t last long though, and we pointed Osprey back on her original course, keeping a sharp look out for the speeding inflatable, which never returned.

The high winds continued through the night and we also had a picture perfect full moon to light up the night skies. It was so bright out that the person at the helm was able to see clearly in every direction. We pulled into Hanalei Bay a little after 11:00 am (HST); 24-hours after leaving the fuel dock at Ali Wai Marina in Honolulu.

Hanalei Bay is a beautiful crescent-shaped bay, lined by palm trees on the beach and mountain peaks just behind. Not only is it a favorite recreational area for the locals, it is also the staging grounds for cruisers heading back to the Pacific Northwest in late summer. The bay is often filled with sailboats biding their time on Kaua'i prior to setting sail.

The bay opens to the Pacific Ocean and the sunsets are truly spectacular. Winds that come up in the daytime typically subside in the late afternoon, leaving the boat facing the shore. With the boat facing the shore, the two long seats on either side of the cockpit face aft which is the same direction as the setting sun. Makes for an incredible end of the day.

We headed into town, via dinghy, to get an idea of what kind of supplies might be available to us when we get ready to head back to Seattle, and were surprised to find that the grocery store that was described as only having “the basics” was more stocked than reported. A rain storm moved in and loads of people could be seen standing under awnings watching the rain come down (by the bucket full, and I’m from Seattle, so I think I know a thing or two about rain!). We decided to make a run for it and cross the street and managed to get soaked just the same. As it rains pretty much every day (usually a brief passing shower, then the sun come out), people usually take it in stride. It didn't seem to bother these guys.

Just a word on beaching the dinghy mentioned above. We motored the dinghy to shore and then had to drag it 100 feet up the shore to beach it. Now, Richard and I both get to the gym as often as we can but we must have lost all of our muscle strength because lifting and dragging the inflatable dinghy (granted, the out board motor was attached) up the beach took way more effort than either of us anticipated.

Since we had expended so much effort to beach the dinghy, we decided to make the most of this trip to town and had dinner in town. After dinner we headed across the street to Java Kai and had chai and pie; I like to think of it not as dessert but as fuel to drag the dinghy back down the beach.

July 25, 2010, 19:32 HST

2010-07-30T22:53:00.000-07:00

N 21°17.567’, W 157°51.404’
Just another day in Paradise…Part III

Let’s just say that re-provisioning without a car is not my idea of fun. We walked to the Ala Moana Center which had a Foodland in it. We had each brought our backpacks and I also brought our all-purpose canvas bag to tote groceries back to the marina. We ended up filling all three bags plus some plastic shopping bags. Richard even had three bags of ice in his backpack. I kidded him that his load should be getting lighter as we walked to the marina as I thought the sun would surely melt the ice along the way. Once back at the boat, we unpacked the groceries and headed out for more supplies.

We ate lunch in the food court as we didn’t want to waste time finding a restaurant, sitting down, ordering then waiting for our food. This was a lot more convenient and essentially next door to the Foodland. Our second trip to the grocery store was just as packed as our first but we think we got everything we needed. All the tour books we’ve looked at indicated that re-provisioning in Hanalei Bay may be a bit difficult.

Dinner at a local hamburger joint was satisfying and without any of the difficulties associated with trying to eat out ethnically and not being able to adequately read the menu. There was a photo of Barrack Obama ordering at the counter of this particular restaurant so it at least passes the democratic leader of the free world’s idea of a decent hamburger stand.

Since we were leaving Honolulu tomorrow for Kaua’i, we didn’t make a late night of it. Tomorrow was going to be the beginning of a 24-hour, over-night passage so we both wanted to get a good night’s sleep since it would be our last for at least a couple nights.

July 23-24, 2010, 18:45 HST

2010-07-28T23:37:00.000-07:00

N 21°17.567’, W 157°51.404’
Just another day in Paradise…Part II

The 23rd was a blur involving the beach, the pool at the hotel, a couple of venti, green iced tea things, dinner and drinks. I walked up and down Waikiki Beach a few times and ended up putting my towel down at Queens Surf Beach down at the Diamond Head end of Waikiki. Richard had gone back to the boat to check on the refrigerator so I had most of the morning and afternoon to myself.

We ended up doing dinner at a restaurant in the Marriott (Sansei Seafood Restaurant) and there was tons of food, including variations on sushi rolls that we had never tried before. The panko-fried shrimp roll was especially good. We headed to Hula’s Bar and Lei Stand in the Waikiki Grand Hotel after dinner where we had a beer, then I left as I was pretty much wiped out from all the sun during the day. I walked along the beach back to the hotel and was surprised to see lots of people fishing right off of Waikiki Beach.

On Saturday morning, I woke up early to jump on a bus and head out to Leonard’s Bakery in search of malasadas, the Portuguese fried donuts that all the tour books say you have to try when in Hawai’i. The bus dropped me off about a half a mile from the bakery and I walked the rest of the way. Despite it being only 8:00 in the morning, it was really hot out. By the time I reach the bakery, I was sweating profusely and craving a venti green iced tea thingy like mad.

There was a fairly long line of people queued up to place their malasada orders and I worried that they might run out. I’m sure the staff at Leonard’s is used to this type of demand because as soon as one tray emptied, a new one quickly took it place in the display case.

Just to be on the safe side, I ordered a dozen (six regular, six cinnamon). I also sampled the flavor of the month malasada, which was guava, and despite what anyone says, it was, as they say here in the islands, ono (delicious!), despite the creamy filling being an unnatural pink color

After picking up my malasadas, I walked to the nearest Starbucks for my venti…in preparation for the long walk back to Kuhio Street where I would be able to pick up a bus. I called Richard along the way to tell him that I had the goods and was on my way back to the hotel. We also stopped down at the breakfast buffet to fortify our malasadas with fruit, juice and tea. I’m not sure why Richard insisted on this, I would have been just as happy to just eat all the malasadas while they were still warm with no leftovers.

After checking out of the hotel, we walked back to the boat to plan the rest of our afternoon. We noted that Hula’s was sponsoring a catamaran outing off of Waikiki Beach and decided that this would be a great chance to get out on a boat on the water…wait a minute! That’s how we got down here in the first place! You would think that the last thing a boater wants to do is get on another boat and sight see.

We justified this excursion by remembering that we didn’t have to prepare the boat, we didn’t have to steer or raise the sails, or trim them or any of the hundreds of other things you have to do while you’re sailing a boat. All we had to do was sit back, relax, have a drink, swim in the ocean, mingle with the other tourists, and leave the boat when the whole thing was done. It was fun and we enjoyed our couple of hours on the water.

We returned to the boat and made plans for re-provisioning the boat for the trip to Hanalei Bay on Kaua’i. Shopping without a car…this should be interesting!

July 22, 2010, 22:15 HST

2010-07-23T11:07:00.000-07:00

N 21°17.567’, W 157°51.404
Just another day in Paradise…

Today was just another day of sun, surf and shopping. Richard worked on the refrigerator on the boat and I went out in search of a hotel room for a couple of nights using my Hilton rewards, a haircut, the beach and some shopping. I found everything I needed in Waikiki, the bustling tourist end of Honolulu. I know, Waikiki is the last place you might expect to find outdoorsy, sailing guys, but here’s the deal. I haven’t had a regular shower in a tub since June 11th; and before you go all “Ewww, gross,” let it be known that I have showered both in marinas and on the boat. Just not in a regular shower that you step into or one that has an endless supply of hot water. And besides, I didn’t spend the greater portion of the last two years on the road for work for nothing. Those Hilton points came in real handy and I was able to score a top floor suite at the Embassy Suites in Waikiki for two nights. We had an ocean view room with separate living room, bedroom and bath, and the best part of the whole deal was that the room didn’t rock. It was stationary! Ahh, the simple things in life that we take for granted.

After securing a hotel room, the next item on my list was a haircut. I quickly found a place and dispatched that task within 30 minutes. How convenient! Next was finding the beach. Finding the beach was no problem; finding an empty spot to put down my towel was another story. Waikiki is very crowded this time of year and there were keikis (Hawaiian for children) everywhere. I finally put down my towel, rented a surf board and tried my luck on the breaks at Waikiki (foot is still broken, by the way). Within no time I was surfing down some small to medium waves but the little keikis around me were pulling off much bigger waves and rather than try something I might not have been prepared for (and possibly screw up my foot even more!), I decided to retire my surf board while I still had my dignity (and only one broken foot). I think it was a good decision on my part.

The first time Richard and I walked around Waikiki we were killing time before heading to Roy’s for dinner. Amidst the Louis Vuitton, Prada, Fendi, Gucci, etc., Richard asked how much shopping could anyone possibly need to do while on vacation. I assured him that some needed all this…and more. I didn’t make it out of Waikiki without stopping in at the Louis Vuitton store. I had convinced myself that I needed a wallet (and a wallet I did get!).

From there it was back to the hotel for a short nap while I waited for Richard to join me. We went to dinner at a place called Okonomiyaki Chibo which is a teppanyaki-style restaurant. The food was inventive and interesting, not to mention very good. After dinner, we returned to the hotel room and just chilled. A day in Waikiki can be exhausting after all!

July 21, 2010, 21:48 HST

2010-07-23T11:03:00.000-07:00

N 21°17.567’, W 157°51.404’
Hawaiian Culture…
Richard and I went to the Bishop Museum today and I have to admit that I have mixed feelings about that visit. On the one hand, it was great to see all the artifacts from pre-western contact Hawai’i. The feather capes, helmets, and royal sashes were remarkable; the official royal sash that Kamehameha I wore actually had been handed down through the generation of Hawaiian chiefs dating back to the 1400s. The museum officials know this because a feather fell off of the sash in 2007 and scientist carbon dated that feather to that time period. There was also a room filled with feather standards (think big sticks with a feather hat attached to the top) dating back to Kamehameha I.

In addition to the royal artifacts held by the museum, there were also artifacts from everyday life in Hawai’i. Fishing hooks, cordage, poi pounders and poi bowls, kapa (cloth made from pounding paper mulberry bark), drums, leis, jewelry, and other tools were also displayed. A very well-rounded collection.

The main exhibit, however, centered around early Hawaiian mythology and religion. The Hawaiians understood their world as being one created by, organized and subject to theirs gods, who they collectively referred to as Kū. There were four main kū, and rather than make a mistake in trying to outline their responsibilities, I would rather just direct anyone interested in this subject to do a simple internet search to research this topic. Simply put, the main Kū represented the male aspects of the world and Hina represented the female aspects. The exhibit was entitled, “E Kū Ana Ka Paia: Unification, Responsibility and the Kū Images,” and I highly recommend it to anyone who will be in Honolulu between now and October 2010.

The other major exhibit at the Bishop Museum was entitled, “Surfing: Featuring the Historic Surfboards in Bishop Museum's Collection” and is definitely worth seeing, especially if you have ever surfed or attempted to surf.

Most of what we hear about in Hawaiian history is post-Cook history; that is, “history” given to us through the writings of Captain James Cook who visited the islands in the late 18th century. Very little is told of the Hawaiian people and culture prior to his “discovery” of the Sandwich Islands, despite the islands being populated for centuries and a major culture emerging in the area. My mixed feelings about going to the museum stem from the fact that once the Hawaiian peoples were contacted by westerners, specifically the missionaries of numerous denominations, they were doomed to lose everything that distinguished them as a cultural entity. In their efforts to “civilize” the Hawaiian people through the introduction of their various religions, the missionaries effectively erased from the collective consciousness of several generations of Hawaiians their culture and traditions that had existed for centuries prior to western contact. John Krakauer coined the phrase, and titled one of his books, Under the Banner of God, and I think that the principle behind that phrase can rightly be applied in this context as well. No doubt the missionaries thought they were saving the souls of the people they saw as ‘savages”; but isn’t that always how it starts? The imposition of one set of beliefs above another rarely ends well and history is replete with examples of this type of mindset. One has to wonder what motivates an individual to decide that an entire culture needs fixing.

Now before some of you go off on me and start citing examples of cultural wars that were worth fighting, and I admit there are some, please take even a cursory look at the Hawaiian culture pre-western contact. The society was based on equality for most; yes, there was a monarch system of government in place, but within that system, women were recognized alongside men as being rulers and ancestral lines of royalty followed both men and women. There were also well established orders and rules that the people understood to come from their gods and the consequences for breaking those rules were known and understood as well. Things weren’t arbitrary or subject to the fickleness that some first world judicial systems appear to be bogged down by. My favorite aspect of the early Hawaiian code of law is the “get out of jail free” clause that basically allowed a rule-breaker to be spared the death penalty if he/she could simply outrun his/her fellow citizens and make it to a place of refuge called a heiau.

I did not intend for this blog entry to anger or offend anyone. My life experiences have taken me to certain places where I have seen this destruction of culture (specifically the Navajo and Apache tribes of northern Arizona, and now the Hawaiians). Luckily, in the mid-twentieth century, Hawai’i experienced a resurgence of cultural pride and took steps to bring back the traditional ways of their island heritage. It goes beyond the hula dancing and luaus and is more connected to the efforts to put Hawaiian lands and governance back in the hands of native Hawaiians. And even though Hawaiians make up a minority of the current population of the state of Hawai’i, their efforts towards self-determination in those things Hawaiian should be recognized as a movement worth supporting.

And this is what I’ve been thinking about for the past few days…no apologies.

July 20, 2010, 21:29 HST

2010-07-21T01:16:00.000-07:00

N 21°17.567’, W 157°51.404’
Greetings from Honolulu!

The passage from Moloka’i to Oahu took about 9 hours with the first 3 being in light winds with the motor running. Once we passed Laau Point on the southwestern coast of Moloka’i, we finally found some winds and were able to hoist the main and head sails. We had fantastic winds in the mid-20s from the east which made for a great sail to Honolulu. The winds were mainly in the mid-20s but every now and then we would get gust that would sustain itself in the high-20s, leading us to wonder if our winds were actually a little higher than predicted or if these were indeed just gusts. In any event, they were welcomed and we had a fast and physical ride to Diamond Head with waves coming in on the starboard aft quarter. Some of these waves were pretty big, in the 10-12 foot range, and would raise Osprey high on the crest and then we would race down the face of the wave at incredible speeds. Like I said, it was a fun day out on the ocean.

We put in at Kewalo Basin Harbor which is adjacent to downtown Honolulu and east of Waikiki. Kewalo Basin has historically been more of a commercial harbor with lots of parasailing, fishing and sightseeing boats filling the marina, and while those enterprises are still present, there are also a fair number of transient and local pleasure boats docked here. It’s a basic marina with water, electricity, and restrooms across the street. No showers, but we pulled out our sun shower and that works great. Only takes about an hour to heat up the water and you’re good to go. Since we are in a public marina, we hang the shower through the hatch in the head and shower in there. If we were in a secluded anchorage, we would probably hang it on deck somewhere and shower out there.

Since we had had a long day, we grilled some chicken that I had started marinating before we left Moloka’i, with sides of grilled zucchini and purple sweet potatoes. Never get tired of seeing those bright purple mashers on the plate!

Yesterday, we did some boat chores in the morning and then headed out to Chinatown for lunch. I had my mind set on a Filipino plate lunch and we were not disappointed. Inside the Maunakea Marketplace, past all the fish and produce vendors, is a long hall with about a dozen or so stalls hawking plate lunches from all corners of the southeast Asian peninsula. We opted for one of the stalls that looked like we could identify some of the food and dove in for a delicious lunch. I had a spicy pork dish and Richard, having first asked what one of the dishes was (“intestines”), opted for the milder madras curry chicken. Mine was wicked hot, even by my standards, and I was sweating by the end of it (a good sign in my culinary book); even needed to buy an extra water. We left the lunch hall and headed outside in search of dessert. What we found was a coconut tart and a pastry thing that included a toasted coconut shell, covering a sweet bean paste inside with a salty center of some other substance. It must have been good because Richard ate the whole thing down.

Dinner was less exciting as we went to a regular sushi place that was crammed between a couple of strip clubs. Despite the bookend establishments, the place and the food were decent (albeit a little over priced) and the walk back to the boat justified desserts.

Today started with a visit to the Ward Center Farmers Market which is less of a farmers market and more of an Asian-themed Costco. You could get anything in there; a lot of what you would expect, and more than a few things that I didn’t expect! Bought a few groceries including some sake, quail eggs (not sure what I’m going to do with them but I had to have them!), wasabi peas, milk, orange juice and ice. I had two different people help me pick out the sake and they both referred to the sake they steered me towards as "girl" sake which I guess is how they translated by attempts to establish that I have never drank sake before. One woman insisted that I buy the sake with the plums in it because after you eat the plums "you very drunk, any you didn't drink!" Needless to say, I passed on the potent plums.
I passed up a lot of things that I really wanted to buy; things I had no idea what I'd use them for but kept thinking, "I have to have this stuff!" In any event, it was a great adventure and and fun time exploring a world where nothing's written in English, and you just have to guess what something is or used for based on the pictures printed on the packaging. Fun times

After my Asian-Costco experience, Richard and I headed out to a parking lot where there was a truck dishing out Hawaiian plate lunches. These were the real deal and even included haupia (that coconut gelatin dessert served at luaus). I know, in the corner of a parking lot across the street from the Ward Center; whodda thunk it?

For those of you that think that the cruising life is one of absolute bliss amongst palm trees, sandy beaches, turquoise waters, etc., here’s a little reality check for you. Today after lunch, Richard and I schlepped our dirty laundry (over a month’s worth!) to a laundromat in Waikiki and spent 3 hours doing laundry. No palm trees (okay, so outside the coin laundry there were palm trees), no beaches (alright, so we were a mere 2-3 blocks from the beach), no turquoise waters (hmmm?); just piles and piles of laundry. Not glamorous, but somebody had to do it and since no one else volunteered Richard and I bit the bullet and did laundry.

We decided to reward ourselves tomorrow and do a little sightseeing. Hoping to get to the Bishop Museum; they currently have an exhibit on historical surfboards that I want to see.

July 17, 2010, 19:50 HST

2010-07-19T11:02:00.000-07:00

N 21°05.01’, W 157°01.71’
Three islands, One entry…Part II

We moored the boat off of Lahaina on one of the Lahaina Yacht Club moorings. It turned out to be reserved for the Vic-Maui racers who were due in any day, but as it was still a little bit early for the bulk of the racers to arrive in Lahaina, the yacht club let us have the mooring as long as we left by Saturday morning (which was our plan anyway).

Lahaina is certainly the busy tourist town. I’m not saying that we didn’t have a good time or that it wasn’t pretty, but it was sure full of tourist at every corner. This stands in stark contrast to Hilo where we mostly ran into locals. Our first night in Lahaina we ate at Cheeseburger in Paradise for no other reason than I was craving a burger. Our 30 minute wait ended up being less than 5 minutes which we greatly appreciated.

After dinner it was time to head back to the boat as it was already getting dark. Being as close as Hawaii is to the equator, and as the state does not observe daylight savings, the sun sets at a fairly consistent time of around 7:00 pm (give or take) every day. In addition, the marina along the main drag in Lahaina is quite busy shuttling tourist off at all hours for parasailing, snorkeling and sunset cruises, and we didn’t want to get caught in that fray.

On our second day in Lahaina, Richard stayed on the boat to make bread and I went into town to get a plate lunch (kalua pork, chicken long rice and the ubiquitous macaroni salad), check out the beach and hit the yacht club showers. Not sure which of the three was the best considering I was craving all three!

The plate lunch was awesome (and huge!) and exactly what I expected it to be. I’m not sure if this particular pork came out of an imu or was just cooked in an oven but it was the most tender and moist and flavorful meat.

Next I hit the beach off to the side of Banyan Tree Park. The water temperature was in the high 80s and delightfully refreshing. I walked a fair length of the beach before actually going in the water. The waves lapping against by feet (still broken!) felt great and when I actually did take the plunge, I was surprised at how refreshing the water was even though it was pretty warm.

The last thing I did was hit the showers at the Lahaina Yacht Club and man, was that exactly what the doctor ordered. You take for granted that you get to shower every day when you’re in your regular life but life on a boat on a trans-oceanic passage isn’t your regular life and showers are a rare commodity. Personally, if there is the opportunity to have a shower, I take it, no matter what the cost or hassle. Broken foot or not, I would climb 10 flights of stairs in the blistering heat to reach a shower, but that’s just me.

I returned to the boat and Richard and I went back to shore for some sight-seeing (and a venti, green iced-tea lemonade, three-quarters tea, one pump classic from that coffee place) and dinner. We both had the sea bass special (locally procured fish) which had an Alaskan King Crab-Panko crust, which was artfully executed. Gelatos for dessert and we were heading back to the boat before sundown.

This morning, we left Lahaina for Moloka’i. As we left the mooring and entered the Auau Channel, the winds were very light and flukey, coming and going from every which direction. As we got closer to the confluence of the Auau and Kaholi Channels, the wind picked up and quickly became a brisk breeze in the mid-20s (with gusts to 33 knots) out of the North and Northeast, perfect for a beam reach sail across the channels towards the island of Moloka’i. Once we got closer to land, we finished our sail with a broad reach which took us into Kaunakakai Bay on the southern coast of Moloka’i. This is what sailing is all about. All those previous blog entries where I complained about the lack of wind or wind from the wrong direction or waves opposing the wind and making forward progress negligible, disappear in a couple of hours of fantastic sailing, Check out the video below to get a feel for what I’m talking about.

Kaunakakai is a small town on the southern coast of Moloka’i and is very different from the places we have visited thus far. It has a more rural feel and is not built up the way Hilo or Lahaina are; in fact, the part we saw was practically devoid of anything that resembled tourist infrastructure. I guess it is this aspect which has allowed this part of Moloka’i to retain its authenticity and escape the commercialism of some of the rest of the island chain. At the same time, there is a certain feeling of struggle here to make ends meet. A very delicate balancing act, indeed, must be at play here.

That said, at the anchorage, Richard and I went swimming off of the boat and were in sight of a bunch of local kids jumping off of the pier and paddling their longboards out to say hi on their way to a buoy they would climb on and wait to be thrown off by the incoming surf. These kids were the embodiment of summer fun and that was refreshing to see.

Tomorrow we head out for Honolulu. We have a reservation at the Kewalo Basin Harbor and will be tied to the dock there for about a week before heading out to Kaua’i.

Sailing in the Auau and Kaholi Channels.

July 17, 2010, 19:50 HST

2010-07-18T00:55:00.000-07:00

N 21°05.01’, W 157°01.71’

Three islands, One entry…Part I
Our last night in Radio Bay, Hilo was spent first on S/V Mist with Susan and Elba and another couple from Vancouver, BC from S/V Reflections I. The Canadians were taking off from Radio Bay for Maui late that evening so we all met on Susan and Elba’s boat for cocktails.

After they left, Susan, Elba, Richard and I rowed back to our boat for some mahi mahi tacos. Elba and Susan make a mean guacamole which complimented the tacos wonderfully. It was kind of a late night and spirits were high by the time the party broke up and everyone returned to his and her respective boats

The next day, July 14th, Richard and I raised the anchor and headed out of Radio Bay on our way to Maui. Richard and Susan made arrangements to have an SSB date later in the day so we could test the transmitting ability of our single side-band radio. It was a 27 hour overnight passage to Maui.

Happy Bastille Day to all who remembered!

More to come...it's late and I'm tired...zzzzzzz...

July 12, 2010, 21:30 HST

2010-07-18T00:32:00.000-07:00

N 19°43.915’, W 155°03.149’

Orthopedic Surgeons & New Friends
I met with the orthopedic surgeon today and he confirmed that I had indeed broken my foot. We discussed the various options available to me and decided that, given all of the practical limitations associated with being on a boat, if I wore hiking boots or at least some kind of shoe that provided ankle support, I would be fine. At this point, I have about 5 more weeks and my foot should be healed. My ability to use my foot without pain will be the determining factor as to when it is completely healed.

After my doctor’s appointment, Richard and I went to a natural food store, Island Naturals, and bought some groceries. We also stopped at Suisan, the local fish market where they used to conduct fish auctions, and purchased some fresh ono and mahi mahi.

We ended up getting together with Susan and Elba from S/V Mist, starting out with beers in the cockpit and then heading over to Café Pesto in Hilo for dinner. It was great to get together with other sailors and talk cruising. Susan and Elba have done a fair amount of cruising and Richard and I took advantage of the opportunity to tap into their collective experience. Hearing them talk about the far-away places that I’ve dreamed about and they’ve been to, made me want to get going on our own adventure as soon as possible. But I guess we have to take this one step at a time, especially with this broken foot of mine.

Shout out to Susan and Elba of S/V Mist; thanks for the company tonight, let’s do it again this summer somewhere in Hawai’i!

July 11, 2010, 19:32 HST

2010-07-18T00:15:00.000-07:00

N 19°43.92’, W 155°3.15’
Taking in some culture…
Today Richard and I went to the 21st Annual Big Island Hawaiian Music Festival in Hilo. It was a great opportunity to hear some talented, local slack key guitarists and watch hula dancers. In addition to thoroughly enjoying the festival, it was also a great opportunity to see locals hanging out in their home town being locals. Neither one of us got any great stills from the music festival but we did manage to get a couple pics of locals sporting island flare.

After the festival we headed into downtown Hilo and hit the Farmers Market. We bought papayas, a white pineapple, purple sweet potatoes, tomatoes, Maui onions, green beans, and cilantro. We didn’t get to the market until the very end and we could only imagine what the full market must have been like earlier in the day. Luckily, the market runs 7 days a week and we plan to hit it before we leave Hilo later this week. This picture reminds me of Dr. Seuss' Green Eggs and Ham. The purple sweet potatoes were actually quite delicious and the steaks on the grill were the perfect compliment (unless of course you're a vegetarian, in which case, oh well).

July 10, 2010, 22:10 HST

2010-07-18T00:04:00.000-07:00

N 19°43.915’, W 155°03.149’

Settling in… First Full Day in Hawaii
A really weird thing happened last night. I went to sleep and then woke up in Hawaii. It’s not a dream and Richard and I really did do this incredible thing. For those of you who think that it’s just the journey that's important, I think you’re missing half of the experience. The destination is just as important as the journey because the destination is symbolic of something and holds some meaning for you in the first place; otherwise, why would you have embarked on the journey in the first place?

I awoke this morning to the sound of the surf pounding on the breakwater outside of Radio Bay in Hilo on the Big Island of Hawaii, tropical birds cooing in the distance, Osprey anchored and sitting perfectly still in a protected bay surrounded by other boats from far off places with interesting stories to tell. The skies are blue and while this is the “rainy” side of the Big Island, I have to remind myself of two things. One, rain is just weather, and two, I’m in Hawaii! It probably rains here every day but not 24/7. So if you don’t like the rainy weather of the moment, you probably just have to wait less than an hour for the skies to clear and the sun to shine.

Today was spent settling into the middle segment of our journey. We both started working on getting Osprey out of ocean-going mode and into “sitting around-relaxing” mode. That involved taking down the lee clothes, setting up the forward and aft cabin sleeping quarters, rearranging all of our gear (packing all of the fleece and other cold weather clothes in duffle bags and stowing them out of the way), cleaning, putting up the bimini (a canvas canopy that hangs over the cockpit to provide shade from the tropical sun…did I mention we’re in Hawaii?!), getting some extra drinking water, etc. We also both rowed to shore and took showers. Believe me, after three weeks of roughing it while under way on the open ocean, real showers are the most incredible thing on earth.

We decided to go into town for dinner and ended up at a sushi restaurant that we had gone to and enjoyed the first time we came to Hawaii (Ocean Sushi Deli). After dinner we walked around downtown Hilo for a little bit (after all, I do have this broken foot thing going on) before calling a taxi to take us back to the boat.

I’ve decided to use Brian’s Back Blog as the place for me to ramble. Anyone that knows me knows that I have thoughts about everything. Some of these thoughts are well thought out, while others tend to appear half-baked. So be it, it’s a choice that you, the reader, get to make on whether or not you want to read what I’m observing and experiencing. Like always, I welcome your comments and look forward to engaging in a healthy dialog while here in Hawaii. Mahalo and Aloha!

July 9, 2010, 21:30 HST

2010-07-12T19:43:00.000-07:00

N 19°43.915’, W 155°03.149’

We made landfall today just before noon local time. Richard rowed to shore to meet with the harbor master to check us in. While you don’t go through customs, per se, when you arrive by boat in Hawaii you do have to go through agricultural customs. Basically, the local authorities want to ensure that you are not inadvertently bringing in pests (like insects or plant diseases) hitch hiking on your produce. There is also some amount of paperwork to fill out in order to get the permits necessary for anchoring around the islands.

While Richard was busy with the harbor master, I got ready to go to an urgent care facility here in Hilo. On June 29th I was coming down the companionway and a wave hit the boat at just the right angle as I was taking my last step and I didn’t quite land it right and ended up coming down on my ankle the wrong way and hard. It immediately did not feel right. I looked up sprained ankle in our medical reference and began the RICES protocol (Rest, Ice, Compression, Elevate, Splint) which initially helped. My foot looked horrible; black and blue and all swollen. Richard looked at it and we really thought that it might just be a really bad sprain. I took ibuprofen, continued to elevate, ice, and re-wrap with ace bandages, and it actually started to feel much better and I was able to continue with my watches. After about 5 days, I started to taper down the ibuprofen and noticed that it was still quite painful. That’s when the whole idea of sprained ankle came into question. But, wanting my glass to be half full (of a good microbrew at this point!), I continued to tell myself, “This is just a sprain and the pain is because I’m backing off the ibuprofen and exercising it.”

Just to be safe though, I told Richard of my plan to go to the urgent care facility once we made landfall. He agreed that this was a good idea.

When Richard returned from the harbor master he told me that he had met Susan from S/V Mist, which was anchored right next to us. They had chatted and she had stopped by in her dinghy on her way to shore earlier to chat. As Richard and I were getting ready to have Richard row me to shore, Susan stopped by and said that she and her partner had rented a car and were planning on going into town in a few minutes and did we want to hitch a ride with them. I immediately jumped on this opportunity and got a ride into town with Susan and her partner, Elba.

Susan and Elba drove me to the urgent care facility and told me that when they were done with their errands, they would swing by the urgent care place to check if I had left yet and if I hadn’t they would wait and drive me back to the boat. I told them that to thank them for their kindness, Richard and I had a bottle of good champagne on the boat that we were going to open to celebrate making it to Hawaii and that we would let them know when we opened it and invite them over to toast along with us.

It actually didn’t take me that long at the urgent care facility and yes, I had indeed broken my foot in one place. The treating physician made an appointment for me with an orthopedic surgeon for July 12th to discuss my options for the rest of the summer given that casting at this point would pose quite a problem considering my plans to sail back to Seattle in August. They actually tried to get me to wear a “boot” but that hurt more than not wearing it so I initially declined the boot, stating that I would wait to hear what the orthopedic surgeon thought was my best options at this point.

I left the urgent care facility and started walking back to the boat. I knew it was kind of far, but not too far. Well, it wouldn’t have been very far if I had taken the most direct route but as it turns out, I didn’t take the most direct route and ended up walking about 4 miles…with a broken foot!

I finally made it back to the boat. We rested a bit and then took a taxi to a restaurant for dinner.

And thus ended my first day in Hawaii.

July 8, 2010, 19:20 PDT

2010-07-12T19:39:00.000-07:00

N 20°44, W 154°09’
Land Ho!
Just spotted one of the two volcanoes on the Big Island of Hawaii and we are very excited. We expect to make landfall in Hilo, Hawaii tomorrow some time shortly after noon time. No time to blog right now, I gotta go put the champagne in the fridge and start my list of “Things To Do Pre-Hilo” (of course I have a list!).

PS…Finally got to completely bathe in the cockpit during one of the longer afternoon rain squalls. Even had some time do a little laundry…bonus!

July 6, 2010, 20:34 PDT

2010-07-12T19:15:00.000-07:00

N 23°29.08, W 151°31.72’
Sounds, Noises, a Cacophony, & Strange Voices

Today’s rambling has to do with sounds and the various classifications of sounds. I’d like to start with the general category of sound. As mentioned earlier, Richard and I are sharing watch duties with a 3-hours on and 3-hours off schedule. During my at helm watch, I am usually listening to my iPod, which I brought along specifically for this purpose. I have over 5600 songs on my iPod and so the variety of music available to me is quite diverse. I have recently enjoyed going through the various artists that have, over time, proven to be my favorites and relived days gone by when specific songs would play. Perennial favorites such as The Cure (Pictures of You, Love Song, High, Lullaby), The Smiths (How Soon is Now, Stop Me If You Think That You’ve Heard This One Before, Hand in Glove, Bigmouth, Heaven Knows I’m Miserable Now), Cocteau Twins (everything on Treasure and Garlands), REM (everything!), just to name a few of my all time favorites, have allowed me to paint the blackness of the night time sky into a time from years ago, recollected by a particular song. These veterans of the music scene have held stage with a number of my more recent finds including Silversun Pickups, The Doves, Band of Horses, Kings of Leon, Flaming Lips, The Dandy Warhols, Darker My Love, Helio Sequence, The Cave Singers and Fleet Foxes, again, just to name a few of my more recent finds. All these bands, and many, many more, too numerous to name here, have provided me with reflective moments through the dead of night when there is nothing else around me but the moon, the stars, and the ever present open ocean.

[Sidebar: I never play my iPod at ear shattering levels. In fact, I rather enjoy the blending of the music and the sound of the water lapping against the hull of the boat as we sail through the night.]

These are pleasant sounds. Another pleasant sound is the sound of the waves lapping against the hull of Osprey as we sail through the night cloaked in darkness. For most of this trip, the moon has been rising later in the night and the watch from 2100-0000, once it gets dark that is, is in complete darkness. Something about the darkness heightens the sound of the water as the boat sails through it and I rather enjoy that sound as well.

Then there are noises. Noises usually cause concern, alarm or at least pique your interest, but usually not in a good way. Like the funny sound you hear coming from the engine which is totally different from any other sound you have ever heard coming from your engine. That sound suddenly becomes a noise because of what it might lead to in terms of hours cramped down in the engine compartment trying to track it down. Then there’s the fixing part because no new noise in the engine ever presents itself without the need to fix something. Just ask anyone who’s ever taken a marine diesel mechanics class, they’ll tell you.

Next we have a cacophony which is basically a mix of harsh sounds or noises. As detailed previously, when the boat us rocking and rolling while being pounded by opposing waves from every which direction, and everything in the cabin starts crashing into everything else in the cabin, you suddenly find yourself in the presence of a cacophony. The problem with a cacophony is that, like a single noise, you really have to track down the sources of these noises and fix them so that they don’t make noise anymore; otherwise you won’t get any sleep during your off watch. And we all remember that magical number for how many hours of potential sleep are available during an off watch, right? That’s right, three. And just to be clear, anything and everything on a boat that isn’t nailed down has, deep within its being, the potential to create a noise.

The first time Richard and I took scopace, we were both surprised by how much of a “drug effect” it packed. We took it one morning with breakfast and I remember getting up to clear my dishes and asking Richard if he felt like he was experiencing anything weird from the scopace. His dose hadn’t kicked in yet but by the time he got up to clear his dishes, we were both feeling the effects of the drug. I’m not sure what the mechanism of action is for this drug, but it seems to affect your perception of reality. In fact, hallucinations are listed as a more common side effect (great, our seasick medicine prevents seasickness by altering reality!).

One of the main effectss that I noted was hearing voices and Richard acknowledged that he heard these voices as well. The voices sounded like you were at a cocktail party or something, just walking by lots of people who were all talking. You couldn’t make out what they were saying, but you would catch a word here or there. Once we stopped taking the scopace, Richard stated that the voices went away. Hmmm?

Despite not taking any more scopace, I continued to hear voices. Now before each and every one of you has some kind of “Ah ha!” moment and claims you knew you were right when you thought that I was crazy, let me explain. On scopace, I heard voices more or less all the time; nonspecific. Off scopace, I only heard voices when I was trying to sleep down below. These strange voices appeared to be coming from the water and the diesel sloshing around in their respective tanks, and when waves would hit the hull as we sailed through the water. Very specific, ergo, not crazy.

Before I forget, today I spotted a Brown Boobie doing a fly by.

July 3, 2010, 15:25 PDT

2010-07-12T18:56:00.000-07:00

N 28°35.305, W 146°49.845’

Ok, so it’s catch up time for me and this journal/blog. That squall mentioned the last time I made an entry nearly soaked me and my laptop. Funny thing about squalls, you see them one minute on the horizon and the next thing you know, they’re staring you down over the side of the boat. They move fast. The air in front of a squall is also fast and typically in the direction we want to travel; not so much for the air left behind a squall. A squall sucks up all the surrounding air in order to fuel its forward momentum which leaves little wind left in its wake. Once the squall passes, you typically find yourself without any useful wind and rocking back and forth. Not a good time.

So the flying fish thing is even more interesting than previously reported. These fish actually propel themselves out of the water and fly anywhere from a few feet to at least one hundred yards. They even flap their wings (fins) and can change direction in mid air. They really are interesting to watch. The thing is you usually see just one or two of them at a time flying off in the distance. I’m waiting for something higher in the food chain to come along and scare a whole school of these fish and watch them all scatter at once. That at least might make it easier to get a picture or some video footage of them in flight. Otherwise, it’s too hard to know when or where they’re going to take flight.

Two nights ago at the 2100 watch change, Richard was giving me the low down on what had been happening on his watch when all of a sudden a bunch of dolphin showed up and started swimming in the bow wake and all around the boat. There were easily 20 or so of these dolphins and they were all over the place; swimming synchronously in packs of 5 or so or singly darting from port to starboard and back at the bow of the boat. It was a pretty amazing show while it lasted and hopefully we got some good video. I keep looking forward to these pre-dusk shows but they haven’t returned since. Oh well, we still have just under 700 miles to go; maybe tonight. There's a short video of the action at the bottom of this post.

I know! Just under 700 miles to go and we’ll be in Hilo. I can’t fathom that right now. It seems like we’ve been on this boat forever and the scenery doesn’t change, one day goes by then the next without anything to demarcate one from the other and the next thing you know you can look at the chartplotter and there’s land on the screen with an “X marks the spot” for your final destination. It’s just awesome!

I cooked the last of the tuna I caught back on June 21st. We enjoyed most of it as tuna fish salad sandwiches on Richard’s homemade bread (Yes! He even makes bread on the boat! What a guy!) but we also had it for dinner in a number of different entrees. Only wish we had been someplace where we might have been able to grill some tuna steaks up…that would have been delicious! I’ve had the fishing pole set everyday now for the past few days to no avail. I think it’s because the water temperature is too high. Right now the water temperature is 80.3° F and the fish have to be down further in cooler waters closer to 50-60° (at least that’s my bet). Right now I’m looking through my tackle to see if I have something that will help me get the lures to that level in the water column.

We spotted a red-billed tropicbird the other day. We were actually trying to discern what this other bird was that was circling the boat (I thought it was a parasitic jaeger) when out of nowhere (because that’s where we are right now, the middle of nowhere) comes this red-billed tropicbird. It’s a very distinctive bird with a red bill and a very long tail. I think I got a decent picture, can’t remember. And of course we’ve seen loads of black-footed albatrosses.

The past few nights we have also started having some gorgeous sunsets. Of course these are immediately followed by the nightly squalls described earlier. During the squalls it never quite rains enough or long enough to get the soap out to bathe in the cockpit. It would certainly help check that item off of my to-do list every day.

June 28, 2010, 21:00 PDT

2010-07-12T18:51:00.000-07:00

N 33°12.189’, W 139°36.275’

This may have to be a quick blog entry as there appears to be squall heading our way and I’m currently sitting in the cockpit on my 21:00-00:00 watch. Today was an incredible day! It started off with Richard waking me for my 09:00-12:00 watch and informing me that we had a visitor. Now visitor typically means a cargo ship on radar off in the distance, but this morning, “visitor” meant another moth clinging to the dodger! Where are these moths coming from?! Do they not realize that we are over 400 miles from shore? This is just crazy insect weirdness if you ask me. My question is whether this is the same moth that we saw the other day or is this a new moth? I guess we’ll never know as it took off but not until we had photographed the hell out it.

In addition to our visitor, the temperature in the cockpit got to be 89 degrees. It was actually blistering and we both donned shorts and hung out in the cockpit all afternoon. I kept hoping for a rain shower so that I could take a fresh water “shower” but it never materialized. In fact, the sky was absolutely devoid of clouds for the most part and it was only in the late afternoon that we noticed a very different type of cloud formation on the horizon. We are currently researching what these new clouds mean and will report as soon as we know something more definitive.

That squall looks like it’s almost here; gotta type faster.

After dinner, Richard was in the cockpit and I was below trying to nap for my first evening watch when Richard came below and said, “I just saw flying fish!” I leapt out of the bunk and scrambled up into the cockpit in time to see two flying fish flying over the calm water. It was amazing. They have two sets of fins/wings that allow them to glide over the water and not for just a few feet. We’re talking 20-30 feet at least. I have a book on fishing while cruising and the author states that flying fish, pan-fried whole, make an excellent breakfast accompanied by scrambled eggs. I’ve also read that you can wake up in the morning and find flying fish on the deck of the boat. Apparently, flying fish are good flyers but not so good in the navigation department or at least at avoiding things.

June 27, 2010, 21:14 PDT

2010-07-12T18:48:00.000-07:00

N 33°55.471’, W 137°35.842’

What a day! The full moon last night was a great prelude for the day we had today. After a really nice sail last night and some initial fog and cloudiness in the morning, the sun broke through and it got down right hot in the cockpit. I was the first to don shorts but Richard was right behind me as the temperature soared. It did much to raise our spirits and we both spent all of our off-watch time in the cockpit enjoying the newly arrived warm weather.

Around mid-afternoon, we decided to raise the asymmetrical spinnaker and let that fly since we were having a bit of problems steadying the boat with the headsail out on the whisker pole. The spinnaker worked great and we sailed with that for the rest of the day. It’s still up right now and we are hoping that it will be able to remain flying through the night. If the wind gets too gusty we’ll have to take it down and replace it with a downwind sail configuration as a spinnaker sail is made of lighter fabric and cannot withstand the pressures created by winds higher than 16-18 knots. Right now we have variable winds ranging from 7-12 knots so if that continues we should be fine.

We also had two visitors today. The first was a moth! I know! How the hell does a moth get out over 300 miles off shore? The only explanation I can think of (and it’s not even a reasonable explanation at that) is that when we took the spinnaker sail bag out of the lazarette it flew out at the same time; but that doesn’t make any sense. In any event, it flew through the cockpit, headed towards the companionway, then shot off over the port rails and disappeared behind the boat. Weird!

The second visitor was a cargo ship heading to transit the Panama Canal. It looked like a floating warehouse to me. I took pictures only because it was something to take a picture of instead of the water.

Listening to My Morning Jacket’s Okonokos right now. Plowed through 9 hours of The Cure yesterday and wanted to jump overboard by the end of it.

Despite my banana-macadamia nut bread looking weird going into the oven yesterday, it tasted great today. Homage to mom!

June 26, 2010, 21:19 PDT

2010-07-12T18:40:00.000-07:00

N 34°41.937’, W 135°37.638’

Have you ever put on your iPod and gotten right in to a mood? I just did that when I selected Beth Orton from the artists’ category and “Stars All Seem to Weep” came on. Today was a good day. After last night’s decidedly horrid passage (see previous blog entry describing the horrors of sailing downwind), it seems like anything would have been an improvement. But today was a good day on its own. The sun came out and the temperature continues to climb during the day making for pleasant days in the cockpit and forcing me to get out from the cabin during my off-watches. After cleaning the last of the dishes in the sink (a never ending battle!), I decided to make a banana-macadamia nut bread. Banana bread always makes me think of my mother as she used to make banana bread all the time when we were growing up. Nostalgic I guess. Anyway, I threw in the macadamia nuts because I didn’t have walnuts on board (the way mom used to make it) and can’t wait to cut into it tomorrow morning.

After my little baking session, I decided to put together the blog entry describing a typical day for Richard and I and that proved to be a great exercise in that it allowed me to examine what options I had available to me in terms of keeping me occupied while en route. Of course I came up with a dozen little projects and we’ll see which ones get done and which ones fall by the wayside (casualties of an over-creative mind that lacks follow through at times).

The black-footed albatrosses that we’ve been seeing out here are interesting in that they are usually flying around solo; though the other day I did see two of them sitting in the water relatively near each other. They are very graceful as they soar what looks like inches above the water, in and out of the troughs formed by the waves, searching for food. I looked them up in the bird book we have on board and it states that they feed on small bait fish and squid. The latter is weird for me to think about because I typically don’t think of squid as being surface dwelling animals. I asked Richard if he thought that meant calamari-like squid (as opposed to the giant squids of the deep) and he just laughed. Little did he know that my mind immediately went into over drive trying to think of a way to catch me some of those elusive squid to whip up a tasty mid-afternoon snack one of these days.

Wow, this music is really mellowing me out right now. The waves are long and rounded, rocking the boat in a gentle to and fro (not the same as last night), the sun has set and there’s just nothing but Beth Orton’s voice singing and the sounds of the waves lapping against Osprey’s hull.

June 26, 2010, 15:30 PDT

2010-07-12T18:33:00.000-07:00

N 34°48.295’, W 135°00.467’

For any of you reading this blog thinking that this adventure is all fun and no work or challenges, let me point out just one aspect of how sailing can suck sometimes. It’s called “sailing down wind”, and here’s a brief explanation of the concepts involved and how they can go terribly wrong and produce the worst night of your life or least the worst night of your life on a sailboat.

There are 3 principle concepts involved in sailing downwind: sail configuration, wind direction, and wave direction. Let’s start with sail configuration.

You basically have 3 options: a sail configuration known as wing-to-wing, which is a purest or old school method of sailing downwind; flying a spinnaker; or, putting out the headsail with a whisker pole. All three serve to function as a ballooned sail that captures the wind and pushes the boat forward. Simple concept. I particularly don’t like the wing-to-wing sail configuration because it requires way too much concentration on keeping the boat in a very specific angle to the wind so that both the headsail, which is flown to one side of the boat, and the mainsail, which is flown on the opposite side (thus affecting the image of “wings” on the boat), remain full of wind and flying on their respective sides of the boat. Any failure to maintain this exact angle, which has a minute margin of error, results in one or both of the sails collapsing and fluttering about in a most embarrassing manner (heightened by the presence of onlookers, aka gawkers). Since we hadn’t taken the spinnaker out of the lazarette on this passage yet, we didn’t consider this an option at this point, and as we had been sailing with the headsail out on a whisker pole, we went with that on this one particular evening a few nights ago.

Setting the headsail on the whisker pole is a simple matter of attaching the working line of the headsail to the whisker pole, which slides on a track built onto the mast, trimming the sail in and setting the whisker pole out over the water at a 90 degree angle to the mast. The whisker pole provides a solid construction that essentially prevents the sail from collapsing on itself in very light winds or when the correct sailing angle to the wind is not maintained. A great concept, in theory.

The next item of consideration is wind direction. The whole point of sailing downwind is that the direction you want to sail is the same direction that the wind is traveling. This precludes normal sail configurations which typically harness the wind from a close, beam or broad reach (angles of wind direction from the bow, bean or stern, respectively). No big deal, right?

Lastly is wave direction. Waves tend to follow wind direction, but not always. When they do, the ride is very smooth with the boat lifting and dropping in a smooth, predictable flow.

Ok, so now we have the elements of my story defined, so here it goes. We needed to sail downwind so we set the headsail up with the whisker pole. We had flukey winds of variable speed and direction (never a good thing when sailing) and not only were the waves not exactly following the wind but they were actually coming from two different directions. When waves come from multiple directions, whenever they intersect (euphemism for crash into each other) they tend to reinforce each other producing a pyramid-shaped wave that is bigger than either of the two waves that created it. Because the wind couldn’t keep the headsail full, thereby providing consistent forward movement, the headsail just kept collapsing on itself which would initiate a loud “thwack!” sound as the sail collapsed and the whisker pole careened into a shroud. And because the headsail couldn’t remain full and provide that forward movement we needed, the waves, coming from every which way, would rock the boat from left to right constantly. Standing at the helm felt like standing on a trampoline that was on a giant turntable set to 75 rpms and trying to thread a needle. Ridiculous!

But kids, here’s the real story! The person down below, trying to sleep, would toss and turn with every wave that hit the boat. But guess what else would toss and turn with every wave that hit the boat? EVERYTHING ELSE ON THE BOAT! That jar of curry in the galley that I had to bring because I tend to use a lot of curry in my cooking, sitting between the cumin and dill (spices and herbs are organized alphabetically, but you must have seen that coming from me), would crash against the cumin and the dill with every wave that hit the boat. Maddening! The person sleeping would find himself constantly getting up to find the source of one noise, fix it (stuff tea towels or some other soft, absorbent item next to it), get back in the bunk, only to hear a new noise that needed fixing. All in all, this does not make for a good night’s sleep, which if you remember from a previous entry is less than 3 consecutive hours at a time.

Thus my ramblings on the pros and cons of sailing downwind.

June 26, 2010, 10:22 PDT

2010-07-12T18:20:00.000-07:00

N 34°55.100’, W 134°38.224’

Ok, so I know that it has been quite a while since the last time I’ve made an entry here but things have been busy. Most of the time when Richard posts the blog entries, I’m at the helm and we really just want to get something up on the blog so that the map position will be updated. Not exactly the time for me to sit down and wax poetic about the journey rather than the destination being the adventure. But for those of you who do enjoy my ramblings, I have a surprise for you. Once we make landfall in Hilo, I will be posting my observations and commentaries on the journey and the lowdown on whether the journey and associated challenges really are more important than sitting on the beach with a tropical drink at the final destination. Look for that in the coming weeks and I look forward to your comments as well.

At this point in the passage, most of our daily routines have been ironed out which helps to structure our day. We alternate three hour watches throughout the day as someone has to be “awake” and behind the helm at all times. I say “awake” because it has happened that the person who is supposed to be awake has inadvertently fallen asleep at the helm. I won’t mention his name but he has a lot of frequent flyer miles if that helps narrow it down between the two crew members.

During the evening hours, the person who is off watch usually catches up on sleep. And yes, your math is correct; at any given time, we only get a little less than three hours of continuous sleep. The first thing that has to be done after coming off of a shift is the log book has to be updated. Anyone who knows me knows that I’m an organization freak. Excel was a gift from God as far as I’m concerned. I put together a log that captures all of the relevant data for a watch such as miles logged, wind direction and speed, boat speed and velocity made good (VMG for you boaties), barometric pressure, etc. It also acts as a checklist for us to review boat systems while en route. For example, it would be a disaster if someone left the head sink running through the night and all of our drinking water went overboard. To prevent such a disaster, and any number of other boat-related disasters, the log asks the person making the entries if the water pressure switch is in the off position. This guarantees that we are monitoring all boat systems throughout the day to make sure that potential disasters don’t sneak up on us. And the fact that this is done eight times a day, at the end of each watch, is simply testament to my OCD taking over most aspects of my life!

Obviously, the person at the helm has the responsibility of making sure that the boat is heading on the right course as determined by both the crew through the use of electronic weather reports as well as emails from our “weather guy” who provides assistance every third day or so. We hired him as a back up to our review of the available weather information and our review of that data while en route. The helmsman also has to make sure that we don’t hit anything. We have radar, but it takes a lot of power to run it so the helmsman has to put himself on a schedule of turning the radar on from the standby mode to check the horizon and then switch the radar back to standby mode, thereby conserving power. During the day, radar isn’t needed as a visual scan of the horizon can usually alert the crew to “visitors”. We haven’t had much company out here, just a few tankers coming and going to various US ports (Los Angeles and San Francisco) and foreign ports of call (Yokohama, Japan). How do we know where these tankers are going? Good question! We have this clever device that tracks ship information that all cargo ships are required to carry when approaching US waters. The radar picks up the ship’s signal and specific information about the ship (length, beam, current course, speed, and destination) is displayed on the chartplotter at the helm. It’s a little more complicated than that, but I think this is a good overview of how it works (it’s called AIS for you non-boaties).

During the daytime watches, the person at the helm has the same responsibilities as at nighttime. We each fend for ourselves for breakfast and we’ve stocked an ample supply of quick and easy breakfast items that can easily be grabbed and prepared prior to going on deck to start a watch. I’m responsible for all lunches. Ever since we caught that tuna a few days ago, I’ve been making tuna salad sandwiches and trust me, once you’ve eaten tuna salad made with fresh, sushi-grade tuna, you may never go back to that stuff they sell in the cans! Lunch is typically always the same thing: sandwiches, chips, grapes, and a cookie (or two). On particularly cold, rainy, damp days (we started this adventure in the Pacific Northwest after all), I’ll attempt canned soup if it’s reasonable to do so. By that I mean, is the boat rocking back and forth in such a way that if I attempt to make something hot and liquid on the galley stove I may end up wearing it and possibly getting third degree burns? If the answer to that is, “Yes, it is,” then I’ll toss Richard a granola bar and say, “Sorry!” If it’s reasonable to make soup, then it’s made. After all, this isn’t a prison ship!

We’ve been sharing the responsibility of preparing dinners and let’s just say that it’s a good thing that we both like tuna and haven’t tired of it yet!

Off watches during the day are spent catching up on all the other activities that need to be attended to on a day to day basis…like personal hygiene, cleaning, preparing meals, baking bread, cookies, breakfast loaves, etc., blogging and journaling, weather report review and chart plotting. It could also include fishing and preparing your catch if you’re lucky that day, reading, taking pictures and video or just looking at the endless expanse of the Pacific Ocean, wondering where that albatross you just saw came from and what he’s looking for in the waves he skims over while in flight. And when you’ve run out of things to do, you can always do nothing or take a nap (my personal favorite!). We’ll try to get some pictures up of the day to day activities when we reach Hawaii.

Speaking of albatrosses, our wildlife count if really low. All we’ve seen so far are black-footed albatrosses, an unidentified specie of ocean petrel, and the tuna we’re eating. Was hoping for some whales by now, especially the kind that don’t necessarily migrate coastally (like Blue and Sperm whales). We’ll keep you posted.

And by the way, pictures like this don't take themselves. I actually had to climb the mast in the middle of the Pacific Ocean to check on our wind indicator which looked like it was about to fall off. Needless to say, the teeter-tottering from the top of the mast is no picnic and while I was happy to go up the mast, I was even happier to come down the mast.

June 25, 2010, 18:00 PDT

2010-07-12T18:15:00.000-07:00

N 35°45’, W 133°29’

Have you ever dropped anything? Sure you have. Have you ever dropped something 16,402 feet? I didn’t think so. As we were cruising along, I happened to zoom in on the chartplotter to see if it had any information about the area we were cruising in and noted that we were over some pretty deep water. So why not? I got a penny (Canadian penny, eh!), and dropped it overboard. And it sank 16,402 feet, give or take a foot or two. I wondered how long it took to reach the bottom and if anything noticed it hit the bottom.

June 22, 2010, 15:30 PDT

2010-07-12T18:00:00.000-07:00

N 38°47.503’, W 129°08.926’

Yesterday was certainly an exciting day for us aboard Osprey. I was on the 0900-1200 watch and had put out my deep sea tackle, not actually thinking about catching a fish as much as it was something to do to pass the time. I think I mentioned earlier, we are way past being in sight of land and there is absolutely nothing out here to break up the monotony of the day as the scenery is exactly the same everyday in every direction…open ocean. I sent out a green-mirrored spoon with a 4 ounce banana lead on some serious 65 pound test braided line and a 55 pound monofilament leader line. We were cruising at about 6 knots and I had the setup trolling about 100 feet back from the boat. After about an hour I hear the line start peeling off of the reel. I calmly went below and announced, “Richard, I have fish on.” Richard had been sleeping just having come off of the 0600-0900 watch.

I returned to the reel set up on the port side of the boat and tried to begin reeling in whatever it was that I had hooked. Easier said than done; the reel wouldn’t budge. I adjusted the drag to make sure the fish had plenty of room to play and waited for Richard to emerge from below. I told Richard where the net, the gaffing hook and a pair of fishing gloves were and we positioned ourselves to fight this fish to the end.

I managed to reel down on the fish a couple of times but the effort was immense so I decided to let the fish tire itself out. Richard quickly noted my panting and asked who would tire first, the fish or me. After about 10 minutes of trying to reel this fish in, I handed the reel to Richard and asked him to help. I took the pole back and started reeling down hard. When we had the fish in sight, I told Richard to carefully coax the line in by using his gloved hands on the line. This worked well and we soon had the fish close to the boat. Richard got the net and I made one last effort to take up the balance of line so that the fish was within Richard’s reach with the net. Richard successfully netted the fish and between his leverage with the net and my pull on the pole, we soon had a nice looking tuna in the cockpit. He started to struggle a bit against the net but a few quick whacks to the head with a mallet ended that promptly.

Pictures were taken and we attempted to weigh the fish with my newly purchased electronic scale. The fish weighed in at 15 pounds and change and was approximately 2 feet in length. It took me about an hour and a half to clean this fish and we ended up with a whole lot of tuna. We cooked the first of many tuna medallions last night for dinner and they were really good. We are anticipating many more fresh tuna dinners along the way to Hawaii.

June 20, 2010, 09:36 PDT

2010-07-12T17:53:00.000-07:00

N 43°38’, W 127°19’

It’s been a couple of days since I last made an entry here and that’s for several reasons. First, nothing much is happening at this point. We’ve been on the same course, give or take 5 degrees, for the past three or four days. We haven’t been able to see land really since our first overnight so there are no distinguishing features out here to comment on aside from the fact that the Pacific Ocean is an amazing shade of blue out here. I have to look up what cerulean blue looks like because that name keeps popping into my head.

Secondly, it’s been a very bumpy ride. We‘ve had a western swell for pretty much the entire time we’ve been out here and at times additional swells from different directions have joined in, making the ride even less comfortable. Given that, the last thing I’ve wanted to do was sit down and make a journal entry.

Lastly, all it seems I do want to do is eat and sleep. After each three hour watch, I usually crawl into bed and try to get as much sleep in as possible. During my watches, I find myself snacking constantly on nuts, trail mix, granola bars and chocolate and drinking copious amounts of water. The latter is a double edged sword in that I need the water to stay hydrated and fight off fatigue; however it comes at a cost of having to strip down every time I need to use the head. Sailing attire, at least during this portion of the journey where we haven’t hit the trade winds and the tropical weather yet, is much like snowboarding attire and requires forethought.

We’ve seen a couple of sea lions out here which is weird considering how far offshore we are. The fact that there are sea lions out here would suggest that there might be fish out here as well but I haven’t had any luck in that department. To be honest, I haven’t made any concerted effort to fish yet; all I’ve done thus far is throw the line out with a lead minnow hook attached and hoped for the best. And the best has resulted in a twisted mess on the baler. That looks like a project for this afternoon!

We’ve also seen some porpoises. They seem to arrive just when the worst wind and wave combinations present themselves to us and so I view their arrival as sort of a comical relief to the otherwise stressful situation at hand. You gotta keep your glass half full at all times in this environment, otherwise you might lose it.

Richard might have seen a whale, but I cannot confirm this as I didn’t see anything.

The cloudy skies are beginning to break apart and it looks like we might see some sun in a few hours. This will not only serve to brighten our spirits, but it will also give the solar panels a chance to do their thing and top off the batteries. We’ve had to run the engine for a bit over the past few days in order to keep the batteries charged since we haven’t had many hours of sunlight available.

Speaking of running the engine…we have only run the engine during that one overnight discussed previously and for a few random hours here and there when it was prudent to do so in order to make headway during a particularly rough patch of water. Otherwise, we have been quite lucky in that the winds have become not only predictable, but also favorable. Right now we have 12-15 knots of wind from the northwest which is allowing us to cruise along at 5.6-6.2 knots on course.

The sun has definitely broken through the clouds and I think I’m going to take this opportunity to refuel my batteries.

June 18, 2010, 11:12 PDT

2010-07-12T17:44:00.000-07:00

N 46°59.458’, W 125°00.890’

Our departure from Neah Bay yesterday was not encouraging. Upon passing the entrance buoy, we were immediately faced with a western swell that promised to test the limits of the scopace we had taken earlier. We slogged through hours of swells with little useful wind. Once we passed Tatoosh Island, the wind was not coming from the direction the weather reports had predicted nor from a useful direction for our plotted course. We tacked several times then realized that we were making no headway south. In order to steady the boat and make some ground on our plotted course, we fired up the Yanmar and motor sailed the rest of the day and through the night.

The first night watches were actually fairly pleasant. The swells had subsided a bit, and while there was no useable wind, there was a bit of moon out which allowed us to visualize the open ocean in front of us. Morning came quickly for me as I was on the 0300-0600 watch and the sky showed light as early as 0400. The phosphorescence was pretty cool as the propeller churned the living organisms in its wake. I saw a shooting star (wished for better wind direction, forgot to specify a time frame) and four different satellites crossing the skies above.

During the 0600-0900 watch, Richard set up the whisker pole to take advantage of the miniscule wind that had shifted to a more northerly direction. By 1100, we were enjoying a robust 10+ knots from the North; definitely an improvement from earlier in the morning when the headsail just flapped and collapsed for hours on end. The swells were still with us during the late morning but the fact that we were able to keep the headsail full helped tremendously in balancing the boat (and our nerves).

I have to admit that the lee cloths that Richard sewed this spring worked out quite nicely during our off watches. I was actually able to sleep despite the rocking back and forth with little effort to keep myself steady on the bunk. The lee cloths were set up in the main salon on each settee with a sleeping bag and pillow makeshift bed.

Right now I’m letting the autopilot steer the boat as I write this entry and the ride is fairly smooth. The wind has been consistent and that’s all Richard and I are asking for at this point. We have about 70 miles to go to our next waypoint, an ocean buoy well offshore of the Oregon coast. From there, we’ll head towards the first of three waypoints that the weather router provided us with before the final leg into Hilo.

June 16, 2010, 14:45 PDT

2010-07-12T11:05:00.000-07:00

N 48°22.088’, W 124°36.665’

The ride from Port Angeles to Neah Bay on June 15th, was significantly more comfortable than the ride from Anacortes to Port Angeles a few days ago. We ended up motoring the entire way (we had winds directly on our nose) as we made our way west in the Strait of Juan de Fuca. We were, however, prepared for the worst as we each took some scopace with breakfast (just in case). We clearly didn’t need it or maybe we did and it really worked, who knows (who cares, I didn’t toss lunch!).

After getting a slip in Neah Bay at Big Salmon Marina, we settled in to make dinner but were interrupted by the howling of a sea lion that had hoisted itself up onto the dock and was singing for his supper. Not exactly Caruso. We also saw several eagles perched on masts.

In the morning, I headed to the general store to stock up on fishing tackle, which I will no doubt contribute to the sea floor in no time. It pays to have plenty on hand when you know that the bulk of what you will catch are snags on the bottom and not fish. We also Skyped with my parents who just celebrated their 47th wedding anniversary yesterday.

Before lunch we headed to the Makah Culture and Research Center museum, which features artifacts from the Ozette archeological dig site. The site was buried in a mudslide many years ago (a la Pompeii) and then uncovered in the 1970s by winter storms battering the coast. Definitely a must see if you’re ever in Neah Bay.

Spent the afternoon doing small boat projects and planning stowage for our sea bags for once we get offshore. Richard made bread.

This will be the last opportunity for us to post pictures to the blog as we will be leaving Neah Bay tomorrow morning and heading south into the Pacific to Hawaii. We’ll continue to post blog entries en route and then upload pictures once we make landfall in Hilo.

June 14, 2010, 19:45 PDT

2010-07-12T10:59:00.000-07:00

N 48°07.500’, W 123°27.055’ No blog entry for yesterday (June 13, 2010) as the trip from Anacortes to Port Angeles was ridiculously tiring. We left Anacortes at 7:00 am and Julia was at the slip to watch us cast off the dock lines and take some pictures of us as we pulled out of Cap Sante Marina. The weather report predicted 15-20 knot winds in the east to central sections of the Strait of Juan de Fuca in the morning; but what we got instead was 20-32 knots plus 8-12 foot waves. For the most part we were able to sail in this mix but not without a small degree of discomfort. Many of you who know me know that I pride myself on not getting seasick. Well, that is now a statement of the past as I hurled with the best of them and let’s just say that I now have an aversion to carrot cake Cliff Bars! In my defense, we didn’t take any seasick pills before leaving in the morning (who knew?) and the water was more than a little turbulent. Lessons learned are priceless.

After tying to the dock in Port Angeles after 12 hours since leaving Anacortes, we headed to town to grab dinner. For any Twilight fans out there, we ate at Bella Italia, though neither of us had the mushroom ravioli. We decided to spend Monday in Port Angeles to regroup and get ready for the trip to Neah Bay, which will be the last terra firma for us until tying to the docks in Hilo, Hawaii. Given the current weather forecasts, it looks like we will head to Neah Bay tomorrow for at least one night, and then sail south until we hit the trades that will take us to Hawaii.

Thanks to Mom and Dad for seeing us off in Anacortes, Julia for the great departure pics, and everyone else who has wished us well in person, through emails or via the blog.

June 12, 2010, 22:20 PDT

2010-07-12T10:45:00.000-07:00

N 49°05.810’, W 123°43.826’
What a day! Last minute chores at the house took most of the morning so we didn’t leave Seattle until around 11:30 for the drive up to Anacortes. Once at the boat, there were still things that needed to be done, like provisioning the perishable food, cleaning the cockpit, securing the jerry cans and general cleaning. Mom and dad spent most of the afternoon just hanging out in the brilliant sunshine while Richard and I finished the last minute chores.

Once the chores were done, well, most of them, the four of us went out for dinner. Mom and dad treated and we had a great last meal with them at Rockfish Café. Picked up some ice for the fridge and mom and dad left with the car to go back to Seattle and Richard and I went back to the boat to get ready for the big departure tomorrow morning.

We stopped by to see Julia and Charles as they had volunteered to dinghy out with us in the morning and get pictures of Osprey as she slipped out of Cap Sante Marina. We chatted and then headed back to our boat knowing that in less than 12 hours we would be heading for Hawaii. Crazy!

Under Construction...

2010-07-12T00:10:00.000-07:00

Everyone's going to have to wait just a wee bit longer for the much anticipated "Brian's Back Blog," as I had intended to create it as an overshoot of the original blog ("Adventures Aboard Osprey") but due to technical difficulties beyond my immediate understanding, my blog will have a different home. That said, it's going to take me some time to get it up and running so please be patient and remember that I'm currently on "island time" here in Hawai'i. When this blog does get up and running, it will include entries from the past as I have been writing since the beginning of this trip. I will make sure to add a date and location to each of the entries in order to make it easier to follow. I will continue to post to both blogs, saving my rants, musings, and everyday observations for this site, and the more sailing adventure entries for the original blog.

If you've found this blog that means that you've been following Richard and I on our sailing trip from Seattle to Hawai'i and back. Thanks for all the comments and we hope you will continue to check in with us as we make our way up the Hawaiian Island chain.