Friday 15 Jul 2011

Friday 15 Jul 2011
0600 PDT Position: 25 43 N, 145 14 W

10:32 AM Randy, Graham, and I just finished our 7:00-10:00 morning watch. It was pretty much the same as last night with multiple rain squalls, large confused seas, winds hovering around 20-25 kts and gusting over 30. We're still sailing on a port tack heading of 210-220 degrees at 7-8 kts which is taking us closer to our destination. Diamond Head is now only 735 miles away.

According to the daily position report we are in 5th place and clocked the 2nd greatest distance yesterday. The seas have grown a bit and it's still very rocky down below. Curt's face is badly cut and bruised from being thrown out of his aft cabin bunk last night (presumably by the heavy seas and not Mary). Randy is going through our provisions to ensure we have sufficient food for the rest of the trip. The watches are exhausting and we're trying to get some food and rest for what looks like will be a rough day. Everyone seems to be in good spirits and doing well. We all look forward to arriving in Hawaii early next week. 7:45 PM The skies cleared up mid-day and we had some welcome sunshine for the rest of the day. The sea state remained pretty consistent so we continued on our port tack at a rate of 7.5-8.5 kts. We now have 676 nm to go!

For lunch I made the mistake of eating my first Pop-Tart in about 45 years. I immediately felt ill and had to sit in the cockpit to avoid throwing up. At about 6:30 PM another fast boat with a red spinnaker passed our stern about 1 mile or so away. Randy made a nice warm dinner of rice and beans. It's going to be a rocky night due to the high seas but we should make some good progress by morning.