Last day on passage - 2000 nm Cocos keeling to Rodriguez

0800 September 1
Still lumping along in 25 knots. Down to triple reefed main, no headsail. Ran all night, till dawn when the wind went forward, so down came the pole and on came the cockpit spray. Otherwise we are very comfortable. Below,its rough, with the occassional deep roll as we slide sideways down a bigger wave, but that aside its warm and cozy, the sound of pots, plates and cans rattling in the cupboards, marking off the miles as we toss about in our berths.

As of 0800 hours, the beginning of day 12, we are 117 NM to go. We are very likely to make land fall sometime in the middle of the night tonight. The harbour is on the lea side of the island, and according to the charts, well marked. If the soundings are good, the entrance is lite and the seas are smooth, we will enter the harbour in the dark. Otherwise, we'll heave-to till dawn.

Impressions of the South Indian Ocean in the late winter early spring? Rough, but consistent strong trade winds make for fast passages. A bit too wet, but we fared better than one of the other boats on passage who took a whole wave into the cockpit and down the open companionway! He was safe but still bailing hours later. (And this skipper managed his boat and family of wife and two babies under the age of 3.)

The waters are so much cooler than the equatorial region, cooling the air at sea down to woolies, hats and rain gear on watch. Its a bit rude after Singapore and Indonesia, but confirming that we have indeed, finally, left Asia for Africa.

Tomorrow we will dine African on Rodriguez and enjoy other no guilt pleasures of hot showers, quiet beds and a full nights sleep!

After landfall, its often difficult to pick up this email address by ham radio. Contact us on our regular emails for the next three weeks until we set sail again for Mauritius, only 336 NM away.

To all of you out there following our blog, thanks for you attention and interest. Look for pictures of the passage after tomorrow.
Cresswell

All day every day we sail before the timeless SE Wind...

As I watched the sun rise over the transom during the dawn watch,I realized I have not blogged about what it is like at sea, day after day (waiting on email aside!) on passage in a small boat. Its a pity because there is so much magic in the wilderness of the this place. Six years ago I wrote this on the 30 day passage from California to French Polynesia

"Log Entry: 0200 hours, May 29, 2005 Position: Lat N 24° 56.5', Long W 118° 59.1' Wind: NE 10, Sea: NE Swell 4 feet, Weather: Broken Cloud Heading: 180M Boat Speed: 5 knots
The early morning hours are playing tricks with my mind. It seems that time and movement has stopped. It feels this morning as if we are suspended. We are floating on the liquid skin of mother earth - weightless in the tension between gravity and buoyancy, going neither ahead in time nor in space.
Every day, all day, we sail on before the timeless NW wind, but the ocean horizon ahead never arrives, and the restless parade of seas overtaking from behind never cease. Every day the sun rises in the same place on our port side, and every night the sun sets in the same place on our starboard side. Even though the bright green numbers on the GPS are counting down to the equator, even though food is disappearing from our lockers, even though fresh fruit is decaying in the galley hanging baskets and even though laundry is accumulating for wash up day, I am not persuaded we are moving at all. The horizon never arrives.
More likely, the sights and sounds of movement around the boat are an illusion. The sound river of the bow wave ahead and the gurgle of water moving past the stern, is a sign the ocean moving past us, not us through it. Our daily plots cross the chart are just made up by our instruments to keep us comforted. I am not convinced we are moving at all. Every day is the same; the sea, the sky, the wind, the boat, the birds. The changeless ocean has enchanted us with its illusion of movement and progress, but we are stopped and going nowhere, nowhere at all.
.... We are suspended, Irena, me and Conversations. Time and space stand still in this large bowl of a horizon, a perfect circle around us.
There is no place else in the universe where I want to be. I have all the time in the world to just be here."

Speaking of enchantment, with perfect grace, the ocean gave up a fish for our feasting yesterday. A giant Whahoo. It was by far, the biggest fish I have ever caught. No fooling, it was big - heavier than a carry on bag and lighter than an checked bag. It took two of us to drag her aboard. It was taller than 10 year old, but shorter than Irena. I could barely lift it with two hands. It took an hour to clean and butcher her, and today we are attempting to freeze in our modest onboard freezer an estimated 30 pounds of fillets and steaks. Come back to the blog to see pictures after we land, you'll see what I mean.

Speaking of landing, we are 425 miles from Rodriguez and will likely arrive Friday morning.
Cress

From exactly in the middle of nowhere!

Sniff…. Sniff…..[from exactly in the middle of nowhere]
One thing we know without doubt: These days, all three of us onboard are keen for news from friends. So, though it's not completely true we are just sitting about waiting for emails, it's practically true!
Now, we know it's a sure thing that all of you out there have a lot more to do with your time than we do on the good ship Conversations, with our long passage and all to Rodriguez. We know it's not your duty as friends to entertain us either, especially with your full lives of work and family (and your other friends who have not deserted you). We know that while we spend our time in the plain routines of keeping watch, sleeping, reading, cooking, keeping watch, sleeping, reading, cooking etc., day after unbroken day, as an endless, unchanging horizon stretches to flatness in every direction….. [sigh] ….that your lives are full of wonderful places to go, people to see, and deadlines to meet. Yup it's a wonder we get any email at all.
And, we know, as a matter of fact, it's probably our fault that we spend every dusk and dawn bending over our ham radio twiddling dials to no apparent purpose. Clearly it is our just desserts: For all our boasting about all the nice places we have been to lately and all the fun we have been having. Heck if I were in your shoes, I'd probably just hit "delete" every time I saw another friendly damn email from the tropics!
But I know you are bigger people than I. I know you are not taken as I am by petty jealousy and downright self centeredness and do not let your busy lives, like I do, divert my attention from my friends and get lost in the jet stream of modern living. Not you guys!

So please, if you can spare even a few moments, email us at sea by putting "/winlink" at the start of the subject line and (we think) your welcome news will slip through the Winlink.org spam filters and into our inbox. Address: VE7CXW@winlink.org
Radio Operators are standing by!
(with apologies to m Judy and Michael Aschner, who email for email, outnumber even our weather bulletins)
Cress

thank you universe for sending us a little less wind and a little fish for dinne

Eve of Day four ends and darkness descends on our wee vessel alone here in the middle of the Indian Ocean, sailing on.

We had a great day sailing with a little less wind and a wee mahimahi for dinner. We had some sun, a lot less spray aboard and some energy to do more than stand watch and read in our berths. I tackled the drainage problem we have with the water making its way forward from the aft lockers, getting stuck adjacent the engine room in our flat bottom boat and washing up over the sole. Very annoying. Well I bailed, cleared the limber holes, but more needs to be done in harbour.

Winds 20 knots and under this evening, so we are back up to a double reefed mainsail and still with staysail, hopefully for the night. If so it will be a far better cry than last night watches last night stretched out across the companionway trying under the dodger to get out of the spray and the wind. Fairly cool already. Forecast is for 15 knots from the E for a day tomorrow then SE at 15 for a day from the SE. So we are hopeful the 30 knot stuff is finished for now.

Position S 15.01.298 E 087 12.076 course 260 speed 8 knots. Sailed 180 miles last 24 hours. It might be 200 if our windvane would steer straight, but it still beats steering by hand!

Good night world!

Day 4 and all is well

Irena here - Well I guess some of us are taking a little longer to adjust than Cress!

With the wind easing just a wee bit last night, and the sun coming out to grace our day, everything seems just a bit brighter. We are finally getting some rhythm on this passage. Well, at the very least I am finally feeling fine, motion sickness has finally passed. Still a fair amount of motion knocking us about the cabin below. Eitan was thrown across the boat twice yesterday(once with a basin of saltwater - yuck!) - but still all in one piece (except for the saltwater which spread itself all about the cabin sole).

I find when the motion is like this, you need to do everything in slow motion and remember to brace yourself all the time (which is something difficult to do for us type a's who are used to doing 5 things at the same time). So when I get knocked off balance, I get really pissed with the boat, and with anyone who happens to be within 5 feet of me! It's the same as when you hit our head on the cupboard door - that you, and only you left open. You want to blame someone, anyone! But in the end, there is no one there to take the blame - so you sulk a little, lick your wounds and carry on, being a little more careful for a while, until the boat takes an unexpected lurch.... and it starts all over again!

I am curious about how Eitan sees it - will ask him to post his thoughts. We all felt so miserable yesterday afternoon, we actually passed on happy hour! At about 5 pm each day we all get together for a beer, or G&T if we can manage it, or a scotch if things are particularly tough - but yesterday, each in our own misery, too wet in the cockpit to even think about gathering there, and not feeling very social, we just didn't bother. Nothing was said, it just seemed to be a general consensus.

But today is a whole new day! Sun is shining, cockpit dry and spirits rising - YES and did I mention that it is actually pretty glorious out there? Big huge waves that slip under us and carry us forward, a few birds that have been following us and who fly with such ease and grace over the waves, they are like watching a ballet. Today is a great day to be alive!

In the meantime, I will slowly go to the galley now and make a cup of tea...

Sa' fine day to rise at sea!

Steel grey giants roll up behind and under, sea birds swoop and dive, a stout rig pulling strong over the lumpy water. Tall clouds ring the horizon all around. It's clear above. The descending moon giving way on one side of the sky to the rising yellow sun climbing the other. I drink my morning coffee in the cockpit, coming on watch. Its beautiful. Its powerful. And is only today, the morning of day three, that we have emerged from the tough, head down, get-the-job-done transition of putting to sea. Only this morning am I able to appreciate it.
It's been two heavy weather days, nothing like a storm, but brisk. Winds hovering between 20 and 30 knots building big seas in an unbroken fetch of thousands of miles. We are sailing on a beam to broad port reach, with triple reefed main, and sometimes, when the wind abates, staysail. This sail combination gives us enough power to sail along comfortably at 8 knots, and is easily changed up and down with the wind. And we have had rain too, lots of it, washing away the salt temporarily, it only to be replaced from the constant spray from waves running into the boat's topsides. Even in the cockpit, we get it too, a good dousing of salt water, randomly.
Everyone standing up well, looking forward to having the winds abate, and to having the sun prevail.
Position: S 13 38.55 E 091 37.14 Course 250, Speed 8 knots. 1660 miles to go. Cress

And away we go!

Set sail this morning at 0930 for Rodrigeuz - 2000 miles away.
Winds, as almost always in this part of the world, SE at 15 to 20 knots. Making good time this evening as the sun sets. Two reefs in the main and full genoa - better balanced for our wind vane to cope. Sailing at 8 knots plus just the same.
s 12 09.61 e 095.486 Course 256
All well on board and supper calls!
Cress