Guests

It's been another quiet day. I was hoping this trip would be a mellower one than last year's, and it has been. That's fine for us, but it definitely hasn't made for very interesting blog material.

We did have a little bit of excitement today. Jason and I were talking about how little sealife we've seen -- we haven't even caught a single fish! -- and wondering aloud if we'd see more, now that we're moving out of the equatorial region. Before we finished our conversation, we saw some dolphins. There were at least a dozen of them, swimming and jumping around our boat, including one mother and baby pair. They're so beautiful, and they all looked like they were having lots of fun playing in the water Pensive displaced. They stayed for a while and then moved on to other adventures.

Jason and Grace went to sit on the back of the boat later and dangle their feet in the water, but Grace got a jellyfish tentacle wrapped around her leg and got several painful stings. She's fine, but that may have some impact on our eagerness to swim the for next few days.

That's about it. Dinner tonight is pasta with peas, followed by some chocolate from our friends' Deadly Bored box.

Latitude: 7.7276 S
Longitude: 151.8119 W

https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/staticmap?zoom=4&size=600x300&markers=color:purple%7C-7.7276,-151.8119

Target practice

We're having some problems with our satellite connection, so we tried to send this update last night but can't tell if it went through. This may be a repeat. Sorry!

--

Last summer, our friends made us a sealed and decorated box that was labeled, "Survival Kit, open when deadly bored" It was full of games and chocolates and we absolutely loved it. They gave us another one for this passage and we had been waiting for the right moment to open it. Yesterday we hit the two week mark and Nora and I were so ready for something new to do. It was like opening a present. There were 8 water pistols, some chocolates (thank goodness, because we were worried about running out of our own supply), a few games, and nuts. We spent the rest of the day playing the new games and trying to shoot water into each other's mouths.

Today, Papa put a genius plan into action. He'd been thinking about it and working out the lines and logistics for the past few days and Nora tested it out this afternoon. It involved a sort of swing that we could lower into the water from the back of the boat. After a rough start when I ground Nora's fingers into a turning block (oops, sorry N), we dunked her into the water and watched her do tricks in the swing. I was next, Mama followed, and Nora took another turn. By this time, we were hungry and Nora's second time around was more like hanging her off the back and using her for pistachio shell target practice. She really enjoyed it.

The rest of the day was just playing games and reading books. There was another nice sunset and we're sharing bread and an enormous omelet for dinner.

Latitude: 5.7245 S
Longitude: 152.6337 W

https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/staticmap?zoom=4&size=600x300&markers=color:purple%7C-5.7245,-152.6337

Target Practice

Last summer, our friends made us a sealed and decorated box that was labeled, "Survival Kit, open when deadly bored" It was full of games and chocolates and we absolutely loved it. They gave us another one for this passage and we had been waiting for the right moment to open it. Yesterday we hit the two week mark and Nora and I were so ready for something new to do. It was like opening a present. There were 8 water pistols, some chocolates (thank goodness, because we were worried about running out of our own supply), a few games, and nuts. We spent the rest of the day playing the new games and trying to shoot water into each other's mouths.

Today, Papa put a genius plan into action. He'd been thinking about it and working out the lines and logistics for the past few days and Nora tested it out this afternoon. It involved a sort of swing that we could lower into the water from the back of the boat. After a rough start when I ground Nora's fingers into a turning block (oops, sorry N), we dunked her into the water and watched her do tricks in the swing. I was next, Mama followed, and Nora took another turn. By this time, we were hungry and Nora's second time around was more like hanging her off the back and using her for pistachio shell target practice. She really enjoyed it.

The rest of the day was just playing games and reading books. There was another nice sunset and we're sharing bread and an enormous omelet for dinner.

Latitude: 5.7245 S
Longitude: 152.6337 W

https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/staticmap?zoom=4&size=600x300&markers=color:purple%7C-5.7245,-152.6337

Stowaway

We discovered a stowaway on Pensive today! Jason was pulling our lines up off of the floor of the cockpit to prepare it for a gullywashing, and he discovered a tiny little lizard. We named him Marshawn (it's actually a much more fitting name for him than it would have been for the windvane!) and spent rather a ridiculously long time watching him run around. We even made a video and watched THAT after he found a good hiding place. He must be feeling braver today, now that he knows we've discovered him and didn't toss him overboard, because he's come out to say hello several times this afternoon.

We also finished our video project and opened the Deadly Bored box that our friends made us before we left. Grace will talk more about it tomorrow, but the girls spent a while today trying to shoot each other in the mouths with their new water guns.

It gets dark really early here. It's 6:30 right now, the sun has set completely, and the sky is darkening rapidly. It'll be fully dark by 7:00, and as you might imagine, we can see a LOT of stars. The last couple of nights, the boat's wake has been filled with bioluminescence, too, so there have been stars above and below us. I wish we could capture it in a picture, but our phone cameras just don't seem to be up to the task.

We've had several days of quiet calm and good conditions, but we'll be entering the southern doldrums soon, and the forecast is a little more exciting. We're expecting some squalls and changing winds, and maybe even a thunderstorm or two. I hope Marshawn stays safe!

Latitude: 4.2943 S
Longitude: 153.3773 W

https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/staticmap?zoom=4&size=600x300&markers=color:purple%7C-4.2943,-153.3773

Absolutely nada

Not much happened today. There hasn't been much wind but the ocean's been nice and flat. Basically, I finished one book and started another, Mama and Nora made a video tour of the boat, we ate chips and salsa, and we watched a sunset. End of day.

Oh, also, Papa put out another fishing line today with a squid lure on it. Coincidentally, it seems we've entered live squid territory because Papa peeled one off the deck frighteningly close to where my head was. The squid must be a delicacy because when our line was pulled in, the whole fake squid and hook had been chomped off, leaving us with a sad bare line.

Because there's nothing else to write about I'll list the things we do for entertainment out here.
1) Read books like nobody's business (I think my average is one book a day)
2) Do Sudoku puzzles like little old ladies
3) Sit/lie somewhere in the cockpit and stare out at the vast nothing
4) Rack our brains for odd little bits of information as Nora pulls out the Super Quizzes she's saved from the newspaper
5) Because we aren't weird enough already, we also work in Spanish workbooks as an attempt to improve our language skills
6) Play chess (on a magnetic board so the pieces don't fly away)
7) Wait eagerly for one of Nora's hilarious impressions (Olaf the snowman, minions, Jim Gaffigan, and many more)
8) When there are little problems or things to be fixed, Papa does them and every so often enlists someone's help

Latitude: 2.4185 S
Longitude: 153.6633 W

https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/staticmap?zoom=4&size=600x300&markers=color:purple%7C-2.4185,-153.6633

South

Today was beautiful. No falls, no disasters, just fairly calm water and favorable winds. We crossed the equator just after noon today. We've been told about different ceremonies and rituals that are traditionally performed upon crossing, but we just threw a few coins in the ocean (like it's our personal wishing well), and went for a swim. The current was pretty strong, so we didn't stay in the water long, but it was enough.

We donated the rest of our Velveeta to Poseidon, so let's hope he enjoys it more than the girls. The weather over the next few days will tell us. We'd bought some ice cream bars to celebrate, but they'd melted and refrozen several times, so we had some semifreddo to mark the occasion.

We still haven't caught a single fish.

That was today.

Latitude: 0.4633 S
Longitude: 154.3287 W

https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/staticmap?zoom=4&size=600x300&markers=color:purple%7C-0.4633,-154.3287

Disaster Strikes!

Our good luck ran out. Last night we waited until it was dark to roll up the sun shade. It takes all of us and Papa has to stand up on the bench at the stern of the boat to buckle the rolled up canvas. Well, it was dark, windy, and the seas were a little crazy. He was stumbling around and almost falling multiple times before the actual flop. He fell backwards (into the boat, thank goodness) and did some sort of complicated shin-skin-on-the-bench-and-bounce-off-the-nav-thing. In short, he fell off the bench hurting his shin and pride pretty badly.

That's not all, though! This morning, Mama looked down and saw that there was a fair amount of water under the floorboards. That meant the boards needed to be pulled up and the water needed to be drained. Despite his roughed up shin, Papa bailed the water with Mama's help while Nora and I pumped the bilge dry. We think it's just water that has come in when we've had the hatches open, not a leak.

Again, that's not all! Shortly after the water problem, everyone was in the cockpit except for Papa. Before I go into this, remember that we made a four week passage in the rough North Pacific, we've all cooked, showered, cleaned, changed clothes, etc. in the rocking boat and we've all been fine. Now, we were all in the cockpit except Papa when a rogue wave popped up out of nowhere and came over the bow of the boat drenching anything/everything and also tipping us at an extreme angle to the starboard (right). Papa flew across the cabin attempting to stop himself with his elbow and other flailing appendages and landed hard on the threshold to the bathroom. The door is basically a rectangular cut out in the wall. The thing is, there's 4-5 inches between the floor and the bottom of the door. This is the ledge that Papa landed on. He says no ribs are cracked and we joked that there is no internal bleeding but there is a large bruise, so....

Other than all of that, we've had a nice day. We'll reach the equator tomorrow (at least, our definition of it), there were no squalls, and the wind is finally shifting back to the desired direction. However, everyone's hands are absolutely disgusting. The salt has somehow killed the top layer of skin and convinced it to leave us. You could probably trace our path from the lovely bits we leave behind. We haven't caught any fish yet. The sunset was beautiful.

Also, Nora is frustratingly good at chess. No one can beat her, but Mama came pretty darn close.

In all seriousness, everyone is fine, no one is broken, we were and are all tethered to the boat, and everything was completely safe at all times.

Latitude: 1.3369 N
Longitude: 154.8477 W

https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/staticmap?zoom=4&size=600x300&markers=color:purple%7C1.3369,-154.8477

Equatorial Rules

Today was pleasantly uneventful. We had some pretty violent squalls until late last night, but things settled down around midnight, and today was mostly sunshine and good wind. We've had to go a little farther west than ideal, but we were able to turn slightly more eastward today. That's good, because if we'd had to keep going in the the same direction, we'd have missed Tahiti altogether. That would have been a serious waste of time.

We've laid some equatorial ground rules:

1. For the purposes of celebrating, swimming, photographing, or otherwise marking the occasion, we have agreed to consider any position between Zero Degrees, 59 Minutes North, and Zero Degrees, 59 Minutes South, as "The Equator."

2. For the purposes of saying "We've crossed the equator," we've agreed to consider any latitude south of Zero Degrees, 0 Minutes.

Of course, that technically means that we're allowing ourselves to still be on the equator after we've crossed it. Our trip, our rules. (Our justification for this is that we all want to swim on the equator, but none of us wants to get up in the middle of the night to do so!)

We saw some birds today, but no other living creatures. It was the first day we didn't see a rainbow. Our cabin reached the coolest temperature its seen since we arrived in Honolulu: 87. We're wondering if we should dig out our parkas tonight.

We have an exciting supper planned: boiled hot dogs in tortillas with cream cheese and sriracha, broccoli on the side.

Latitude: 3.1000 N
Longitude: 154.9279 W

https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/staticmap?zoom=4&size=600x300&markers=color:purple%7C3.1000,-154.9279

Bookended with fun

Grace here. Mama and I are taking turns writing.

Last night we experienced something we didn't even know was possible. We were in bed when Papa called us outside. We all ran up and saw a stroke of pale white light in the sky across from the moon. We call it a moon rainbow. It was beautiful. I've never seen anything like it, and unfortunately, it doesn't show on camera.

Today started out incredibly yucky. No joke. Yucky. It was gray, it was squally, it was raining, it was yucky. Mama and Papa had gotten up multiple times in the night to deal with no wind and then lots of wind and back to no wind. Nora and I woke up and ran outside once in the pouring rain to trim a sail, and then we went back inside and didn't resurface until much later in the afternoon.

Mama, Nora, and I were lolling about in the cabin when Papa started yelling about a dolphin. So far, the only living things other than ourselves had been flying fish, one lonely dolphin, and some birds, so of course, we ran up to the cockpit. We looked around and saw that it wasn't a dolphin but some sort of small whale. Papa's guess is a false killer whale. Everyone was so excited and then we realized that there were three of them!! They swam right next to our boat, and we could see them while they were underwater and then skimming the surface. It was absolutely surreal.

While the three of us were down in the cabin avoiding the on and off rain, Papa did multiple boat repairs and chores such as taping a piece back to the swim platform and replacing the water pressure something-or-other. He says that he cannot imagine being the ship mechanic on anything bigger because it would be an endless job.

During the time that I was down in the cabin (time being all day), Nora and I realized that right now we're in summer but in a few days, once we cross the equator, it will instantaneously be winter. I mean, technically there's always a day when winter ends and turns to spring and all that, but to skip straight to winter in a matter of seconds is just kind of weird.

Mama is going to make some videos of the boat and how we do things here that we won't be able to send, but you can see when we get home. It sounds crazy, but even boring jobs like simmering sauce can be really hard.

P.S. Tahitians speak French so Papa was teaching us what he remembers from school and Nora and I decided that we sounded so authentic that we would go up to someone on the street in Seattle and say, "le petit dejeuner dejeuner" just to see how they react. This should be accompanied with a hair flip.

Latitude: 4.5492N
Longitude: 154.6917

https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/staticmap?zoom=4&size=600x300&markers=color:purple%7C4.5492,-154.6917

One week

We tackled some boat-keeping chores today. We tidied up a little, did basic equipment maintenance, and hung some lines to dry clothes and towels. Boat life is always wet. Obviously, we're on the water, but it's more than that. We don't have air conditioning, of course, and the inside of the cabin is constantly 95 degrees or higher, so we're constantly trying to balance opening a window to let some air in and then rushing to close it when waves splash over the boat or it starts to rain. The result is that everything is always damp. And it's still 95 degrees inside.

We go through little squalls pretty often. We'll be sailing along, happy and free, and suddenly, the wind will change direction and double in speed, it'll begin pouring rain, and the waves will go crazy. That lasts 15 minutes or so, and then everything just stops. No wind, no rain, flat water. A few minutes later, we'll be back to normal sailing. During the day, we can see the storm coming and prepare for it. At night, there's no warning.

Right around midnight, it felt like Pensive started spinning around in circles, so Jason and I both ran up to the cockpit and found that we were entering a squall and Wendy had broken! The constant vibration of the boat had worked a screw loose, but it was windy and pouring rain, and of course, dark, so fixing it was a bit of a challenge. We ended up taking her apart and turning on the standard autopilot long enough to make it through the night and take another look during the day. She's now back in service, thanks to Jason's excellent mechanical skills.

Later today, we discovered a tear on the bottom of our headsail, so Grace and I made our way to the bow to repair it. That's actually more of an adventure than it sounds like it would be. We have to put on life jackets, tether ourselves to the boat, and walk/crawl to the bow. There, we stay tethered, balance ourselves in a position to reach the sail, and brace ourselves against the wind. That's on a calm day.

The changing weather is pretty cool. It keeps things interesting. We've seen rainbows every day, and watching a squall coming across the ocean can be pretty fascinating.

No picture today. (Will someone let us know if they're coming through?) We're making a couple of little videos to show what things are really like, but we won't be able to post them until we're back in a place with wifi.

We're still making good progress. If things continue this way, we expect to be crossing the equator in three or four days.

Latitude: 6.1856N
Longitude: 154.7906W

https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/staticmap?zoom=4&size=600x300&markers=color:purple%7C6.1856,-154.7906

Nice day in the doldrums

Hi everyone! This is Grace.

Nothing really exciting happened today. There was a squall this morning at about 4:00, when the wind went from 15 knots to 30 in a matter of seconds, going in all different directions, that woke us up before daylight and made for an action-packed early morning! As you might imagine, that means running around frantically, adjusting sails and closing hatches. The whole thing was over in less than half an hour.

After that, we did our usual things and nothing stood out. One weird thing is that we are having great winds and water even though we're in the doldrums. We should have little to no wind and even our weather router (our personal weatherman :) is confused. It's great to have such nice conditions but pretty odd.

This afternoon, Nora and Papa put out a fishing line behind the boat but caught no fish. Papa decided to only put out one line because last year, we untangled more than enough lines from having two or three out at once. While waiting, Nora and Papa got so bored that they began making shadow puppets on the ground and then had a dance party with the one working speaker in the cockpit. Someone is going to go crazy soon.

The photo is of our dinner setup. The water in the background is horizontal but the boat is the one that is tipped. Think on that for a minute...

Bye!

Latitude: 7.9685N
Longitude: 155.2931W

https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/staticmap?zoom=4&size=600x300&markers=color:purple%7C7.9685,-155.2931

Jason's BFF

Today was good. We had great wind (averaging around 15 knots all day -- definitely not typical for the doldrums), and our new drifter sail did its job perfectly, speeding us right along at the pace of a brisk walk. There are, of course, any number of things we could do to go faster, but we're not a racing crew. We're just out here for fun, so we want the trip to be as comfortable and as enjoyable as possible, seasickness notwithstanding. (Also, in case anyone was inclined to take it literally (Hi, Mom!), I don't have bronchitis, pneumonia, or tuberculosis. Just a cough and a sore throat. I'm trying to keep it to myself -- no community cup for me right now -- but I'll be pretty surprised if I'm successful.)

We had sunshine all day and got to do a little teak surfing this afternoon. We kept an eye out for sharks and didn't see any. We didn't see any jellyfish either, but a lot of them saw us and found us worth investigating. They cut our water time a little short but I don't think they'll deter us from trying again tomorrow.

Provisioning for this trip was a completely different experience from last time. We were doing it in Hawaii, of course, at a great distance from home, but we were also doing it at the last minute. It really just means that we're having lots more prepared and convenience foods than before. Grace and I did the shopping and planned for a couple of special occasion meals, like Father's Day. We didn't get to have the ice cream bars we'd planned yesterday, so we pulled them out today at lunch and discovered that they were more like salted caramel flavored foam. Whatever. We poured them into bowls and drank 'em up. It wasn't terrible, but I wouldn't recommend it. The girls have also now had their first experience with Velveeta (they gave it two thumbs down), and today we introduced them to Chikin in a Biskit crackers with Easy Cheese. Even I thought it was gross, and I used to love that stuff. Needless to say, it also got two thumbs down.

Tonight, Nora prepared a family comfort food favorite, garlicky scrambled eggs and bacon with rice. It was perfect. We finished it off with some chocolate bars that had melted and re-formed. We're experimenting with alternative textures.

We had an election at dinner last night to name our windvane, Jason's new best friend. I lobbied hard for Marshawn, but the girls both voted for Wendy. Boring.

We have lots of minutes left on our satellite phone subscription, so we're going to try to send photos occasionally. If it works, here's a picture of Wendy.

Latitude: 10.1602N
Longitude: 155.7230W

https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/staticmap?zoom=4&size=600x300&markers=color:purple%7C10.1584,-155.7218

Sabrina Jones / A: We haven't done any fishing yet, but maybe tomorrow. I'm excited to hear about your trip to Alaska!

Stormy weather

Hi, this is Grace. Today was a crazy rollercoaster day. It started with a super wet cockpit that no one wanted to be in, then Nora and I washed our hair on the back of the boat, and Papa tried to wash the one pair of pants that he's been wearing this whole time. He did not remove the pants to wash them or dry them, though. He sort of hosed himself/the pants and then decided that holding the pants away from his waist and doing a weird leg thing would efficiently dry everything. I'm so glad I'm the only one who witnessed that.

Shortly after that, the sky let loose and tried to drown us in rain. The rain stopped, the rain started. We relaxed for a little while, then we entered the doldrums and the wind died almost completely. We climbed around the foredeck (front of the boat) and put up a lightweight drifter sail and went back to sit in the cockpit. Almost immediately, the wind picked up and gathered speed, so we climbed around the foredeck to take the sail down. The wind picked up tremendously while Mama made dinner (veggie pasta and the surprise of a hot loaf of sourdough bread for Father's Day). It was very exciting. The best thing for me was washing my hair. Try taking a shower, braiding your hair, dumping salt water on your head, spraying it with sunscreen, and repeating the process for 4-5 days in a row. Now wash your hair and tell me you don't feel like a new person. Also, happy Father's Day, your daughters look like homeless people bathing with a hose! After the rain silliness and the wind's quick shifts, we knew we were nearing the doldrums. (The official name is ITCZ, but Mama likes the name the doldrums because it "sounds more romantic and less like a sci-fi film.") If you don't know, the doldrums is a place where the wind stops and starts, squalls disappear and appear, and the swell grows and shrinks. In short, no one really knows what will happen here. Papa was really excited to use the new drifter sail for light winds. It was fun to put up while the boat was vigorously rocking side to side (no sarcasm there) and then watch it for all of 10 minutes before we reversed the process. While we were putting the sail up, Papa and I managed to tie our tethers and a couple of lines all in one big knot. If Nora hadn't fixed it, we'd still be stuck on the foredeck,

As for our health, everyone is pretty much over the seasickness but Mama has a yucky cold. (She says bronchitis, pneumonia, and possibly tuberculosis, in addition.)

Kelly King: we're getting there. We did see a couple of rainbows today, so maybe they're leading us along!

Daughter Izzy: Thanks for your note. I think your turtle saved us!

11.8939 N, 156.0639 W

https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/staticmap?zoom=4&size=600x300&markers=color:purple%7C11.8939,-1560639

Real Food

We're all feeling quite a bit better today. Thanks to our former marina neighbor, Marie, we had some real food -- beef burritos -- for dinner last night, which seemed to lift everyone's spirits. Our diet of crackers and more crackers with an occasional apple was getting tiresome.

We've been having strong winds, about 27-30 knots, and big, unpredictable swells, up to 15ft or so, which are a big factors in our shared seasickness. I was hit the worst by it, but everyone felt it this time. Last time, Nora and Jason were pretty much immune to it. We're all getting better now. It only took four days! It has definitely been warmer than last time, so at least we were sick in swimsuits instead of multiple layers of ski clothes. Today it was around 95 degrees most of the day.

Because of the strong winds, we've ben making what we consider to be really good time, averaging about 6 knots. That feels fast on our boat, but I know a lot of my friends could easily outrun us. I try not to spend too much time thinking about that.

We saw a lot more flying fish (Jason found one this morning that tried to fly over the boat and didn't make it) and a couple of frigate birds. No garbage so far. We did encounter another boat, though, a Japanese fishing vessel. We managed to avoid it.

We have a handy-dandy new gadget on the boat now, a windvane. It's sort of like a manual autopilot. You set it to hold to a constant angle of wind to water flow, and you tie it to the steering wheel, and it just keeps turning the wheel as needed to stay on the course you've set. That's MY explanation. It's very basic. Jason can explain in much greater detail. The electronic autopilot used a ton of our limited power, so we're happy to have this as a different option. It seems to be working perfectly. We're expecting the wind to die off a little tomorrow, which will make for more comfortable conditions.

We're getting closer to the ITCZ (Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone, also known as the doldrums), where we should expect to get a little bit of every type of weather every day. We've heard stories of boats lingering there for a month of more due to a lack of wind, so we're not going to hesitate to use our engine a little. Call us cheaters if you want. We're okay with it.

What we ate today:
Breakfast: Saltines and apples!
Lunch: Bean burritos (one can of refried beans, spread out onto tortillas and passed around
Supper: macaroni and cheese with peppers and pepperoni

I can't get the little map to show up at the top any more. What worked last year isn't working now, so we're just going to have to give our coordinates here and you can plot them if you want.

Latitude: 13.9372 N
Longitude: 156.666 W


https://maps.googleapis.com/maps/api/staticmap?zoom=4&size=600x300&markers=color:purple%7C13.9372,-156.666

General update

Well, the first day was absolute yuckiness. Everyone was seasick and we didn´t eat anything and the water was super rough from saling through channels in between islands. Yesterday was a little better but we were all pretty sick still. Thank goodness for Nora because she was our saving grace and made Top Ramen for dinner. Today got better for most of us. Mama is still sick (this is Grace writing) but she´s slowly feeling better. Everyone had a little bit more food and water which is starting to show in our energy levels. As for marine life, we haven´t seen a whole lot except for tons of flying fish and a couple sea birds. We´re so glad that we´ve only had two bad days instead of last summer´s two bad weeks.

Because nothing exciting has happened (unless you count throwing up and walls of water coming at you exciting), I think I´ll lead you in some Thompson sailing vocabulary. The first one, is the frequently used "gully washer". This means that the floor is just too hot and we need papa to get his 5-gallon bucket full of sea water and drench the decks. An example of this term in a sentence might be, "the soles of my feet are steaming! Gully washer, please!!" The gully washer´s other job is to get rid of ¨gook". Gook seems to consist of salt slime. various small debris, and fish scales from wayward tuna in the night. Speaking of tuna, we really hope to start fishing tomorrow. We can always throw them back if we can´t eat them. Another term is "sucker hole". Nora came up with this as a name for when a small hole in the cloud cover appears and the sun peaks through. Normally, we get all excited and sunscreen up just to have the hole close while Nora reminds us that we´re the suckers for falling for the sun´s trick.

Weather wise, there have been a couple small squalls along the way that bring cleansing rain and shifty wind. The swell is irregular right now which means those walls of water I mentioned earlier were no joke. You see the horizon disappear as an enormous wave comes at you and the boat then floats up and over it and you can literally look down at the people on the other side of the cockpit.

That´s all for today. Au revoir.

P.S. Here´s our position as of now.
Latitude: 16 degrees and 16 minutes North
Longitude: 157 degrees 12 minutes West.


----
This e-mail was delivered via satellite phone.
Please be kind and keep your replies short.

Barf-O-Rama

We're all alive. We're all seasick, even Jason, for the first time ever. Fun times.

Towards Tahiti

We're ALMOST gone.

We'd set today as our goal to leave, but we'd really expected to leave tomorrow, and that's what's going to happen. We're ready to go, but it's too late to head out tonight, so we're planning to cast off at dawn tomorrow. We have a great weather forecast for the next few days, and I think we're all ready to be out on the water. I don't love hanging out at a marina. I do, however, love our marina neighbors (I don't know how it happens, but we are the luckiest family ever when it comes to having wonderful neighbors, in a marina or at home!), experienced sailors who invited us for dinner on Sunday night when we arrived in Hawaii and gave us their advice about our next voyage, including how to deal with roaches, the best ways to store plastic garbage, and what to do when we get to Tahiti. We're sad to say good-bye to them.

We've spent the last couple of days shopping and making final preparations for the trip. Planning and buying enough food for four people for a month is a fair challenge. Planning and buying enough food in Hawaii for four people for a month is a bigger challenge. There's a limited amount of everything in any given store. We visited multiple stores multiple times and bought out the entire stock of MULTIPLE THINGS. Finding a place to store enough food for four people for a month on a boat that already feels stuffed with spare parts and emergency equipment is really almost impossible. We try so hard to find the best locations for everything, and invariably, the thing that we want most at any given time is an obstacle course away.

Want a peanut butter sandwich? The peanut butter is stored under the seat where you're sitting, so get up, move the cushion, slide the wooden lid out of the way, move the plastic bin with the next four evening's worth of meals, open the bin below it, and grab the peanut butter. Put everything back. Don't forget that you'll be doing all of this while balancing on a wobble board at turbo speed. Wheeee!

Despite that, I always feel extremely triumphant when everything is finally stowed away out of sight. We were packing away the Borax and condensed milk that we got at our neighbors suggestion (roach poison), when we discovered that we'd be needing those items sooner than we thought. I hate roaches. They terrify me. My reacion to them can be somewhat dramatic. I did not enjoy seeing two of them on our boat. The thought of setting sail, just the four of us and some roaches alone in the middle of the ocean, is not a thought I would describe as comforting. I have to forcibly wrench my mind away from the scenarios it tries to create. Snakes on a plane. Roaches on a boat. Fabulous. I would say that we remain undaunted, but it would be a lie. I am definitely daunted.

But we do persevere. Numerous traps, both homemade and store-bought, are now in place. I refuse to consider the possibility of their not working quickly.

The food is stored. The sails are prepared. The roaches are dying. We leave tomorrow.