Cabo San Lucas, Mexico to Marquesas Isands, French Polynesia Passage
Sunday, May 29, 2011
Land Ho !!!!!!! It is about 8am PST and we just sighted our first piece of
land in 19 days. We are soooooo excited. We still have about 14 miles to go to
the anchorage, but should be there this afternoon. More later...
Tuesday, May 24th, 2011
At 5 minutes after midnight (PST) this morning, Solstice and Hokule'a
arrived
at the equator in just under 2 weeks and travelling over 1800
miles from Cabo.
What a magical night, stars from horizon to horizon with
perfect sailing
conditions in warm 15 knot tradewinds. Steering the boat
right at the Southern
Cross with Hokule'a (the star) watching us from
directly overhead. Just a little
different from my previous trip here when
we were nearly becalmed in the heat
of the afternoon and I jumped overboard
buck naked and swam from the
northern hemisphere to the southern
hemisphere.
Jackie is now officially a shellback and we celebrated with a really, really
nice bottle of champagne that some friends gave us especially for the occasion.
We (more appropriately I) shared a shot of one of my very favorite bourbons
with King Neptune thanking him for safe passage. We also said a few words and
spread some ashes of our good friend Jeep. What an amazing welcome to the Southern hemisphere. Now only 858 miles to go before landfall in Hiva Oa.
PS: Someone emailed me and asked what music we were going to listen to when we crossed the equator. Our playlist from this morning is below should anyone else be interested.
Sunday, May 22nd, 2011
Jimmy Cornell's book World Cruising Routes defines the Intertropical Convergence
Zone (ITCZ) as an area of low pressure located between the tradewinds of the
northern and southern hemispheres, more commonly referred to as the doldrums.
The ITCZ is typically located somewhere between 10 degrees north latitude
and
3 degrees north latitude. He goes on to say that although the doldrums
have earned
their bad reputation because of frequent calms that could delay
ships for days on
end, doldrum weather can be particularly unpleasant with
violent squalls and raging
thunderstorms. The crews of Solstice and Hokule'a
had an additional concern as at
this time of year the ITCZ is the birthplace of
hurricanes.
Yesterday (Saturday) we entered the ITCZ around 6 am at 5 degrees 25
minutes north and exited around 8 pm at 4 degrees 10 minutes north. We got
really
lucky as the ITZC was moving south ahead of us and then started moving
north over top of us as we entered it. All of the credit for getting us a relatively
benign passage through the ITCZ goes to our weather routers at Commanders
Weather. These guys told us exactly when to turn south and threaded us between
two developing low pressure systems in the ITCZ. We only had a handful of squalls with heavy rain, but winds were less than 20 knots. The boats (and crews) needed a good wash anyway. All said, we ended up motoring about 24 hours straight to get through the ITCZ and the light and variable winds on either side of it. Now we are finally out of the risky area for North Pacific hurricanes and both crews of Solstice and Hokule'a are really happy about that.
That brings me back to the story about why we hired Commanders Weather in the first place. Back in Cabo, after getting fuel and dodging all of the boats in the fishing tournament, we dropped anchor and prepared to go in for our final international clearance out of Mexico. I got on the ham radio to listen to a weather forecast to see if we should leave later that day or wait until the next morning. The forecaster gave the weather through all of Mexico and all the way down to Panama and finally got to our area of interest outside of the Baja peninsula. He indicated that for the next several days the winds would be 28-30 knots out of the northwest until about a 150 miles off the coast where they would diminish slightly. They then opened the channel up for weather questions, so I called into see if they had any longer range forecasts for Cabo to the Marquesas. The forecaster answers my call and says "You can't go to the Marquesas now, its hurricane season son".First of all I was a little taken back by him calling me son, but then responded that it was my understanding that the North Pacific hurricane season was from June through October. He responded that "on paper that is correct for this area of the North Pacific, however it starts May 15th in the area of the ITCZ that you need to cross to get to the Marquesas and we already have cyclonic development in that area". He went on to say that "the safest way to get there this late in the year is to hug the coast all the way down to Ecuador, ducking into hurricane holes when necessary and then turning right to the Marquesas once you are south of the equator". At this point, Jackie and I look at each other not sure whether to laugh or be sick to our stomachs. I politely thank him and sign off the radio.
At this point, I go to my reference books to re-read the sections on passage planning for this time of year (the day was May 9th). I get out Landfalls of Paradise and re-read the weather section. It says that hurricane season is from June to October, but what I had not remembered seeing before was the fine print below it that says "with significant occurrences in May and November". Hmmm. So I go to my next reference, World Cruising Routes, which indicates that the season is from June to October, however "tropical storms do occur outside the listed months and this should be considered when planning a passage at the start or end of the accepted tropical storm season". He goes on to say that due to the effects of global warming he is recommending the season be considered from May to November. Great! So we headed over to Solstice to share this wonderful news and to discuss options. We decide to head into town to try to find some internet access to double check some of the current activity in the ITCZ and to call some friends for a recommendation on a weather routing service. One of Solstices crew, Taylor, joked that he had heard that Starbucks has really good wifi access. The joke being that he had been unsuccessfully looking for a Starbucks since he got to Mexico. After a long dingy ride, still dodging fishing boat, we find a dingy dock and sure enough there is a fricken Starbucks right there.
So to make an already too long of story a little shorter, we got a recommendation to use Commanders Weather from our friends Jeff and Gail on Seawitch (another Liberty 458). After explaining to Commanders what we were trying to do, they confirmed that May 15th is the seasonal start date that they consider, but believed that they could route us west past the historic early season hurricane paths and then pick a spot for us to head south and dodge anything that comes up. Needless to say, the guys at Commanders did an amazing job getting us to this point not only quickly, but uneventfully. Thanks, too, to Bill C. who also has an amazing future at weather routing if he wants it.
Had we not heard the original ham radio forecast and not called Commanders, we would have followed the traditional rhumbline route and would probably still be somewhere north of 10 degrees north latitude. Instead we are looking to be at the equator sometime tomorrow night!
Thursday, May 19th, 2011
A great fisherman I am not. I have done a lot of fishing, but just not a lot of catching. I do however enjoy it. Jackie on the other hand has never shown any interest in fishing. She is one of those people who really doesn't want to know where her food comes from, she just wants it all nice and pretty on her plate.
This morning we hooked up on a fish. I went to the aft deck to start reeling it in, when to my surprise Jackie asks what she can do to help. Before I could answer she had gone gotten the gaff and the camera. She was actually excited. How cool is that I thought, maybe it won't be long before I will be coming up on deck after my off watch to find that she had landed yet another yellow fin tuna. She could even turn out to be like our friend Britta " the Northern Channel Islands Fish Slayer" Hamilton.
So I get the fish along side of the boat while Jackie enthusiastically looks on. She hands me the gaff and I pull the 2-1/2 foot fish up and on to the deck. It hit the deck with a thud and thrashed about as it expressed its displeasure with being on board Hokule'a. At the same time I hear a scream and out of the corner of my eye see Jackie running from the aft deck to the cockpit and disappear down below. So much for Jackie the Fish Slayer?
Wednesday, May 18, 2011
The excitement of finally heading south yesterday morning was awesome, but it was quickly replaced with another type of excitement, an oh s#&t moment. Right after emailing yesterday's journal entry to Jackie's Mom (the best webmaster ever), I grabbed the binoculars to go look for Solstice. We typically try to stay somewhat close to each other when making passages. We drift apart 3-5 miles (still within eyesight) and try to get the boats back together usually before dark each evening. I scanned the horizon with the binoculars and did not see her. The last time I remembered seeing Solstice was around 3 am. She was heading a more southerly course to smooth out the ride and we were heading a bit more southwest toward the next waypoint. With all of the course changes and u-turns from earlier that evening, it didn't surprise me that we were separated. So I pick up the VHF radio to give Solstice a call so that we could exchange GPS coordinates and set a course to reconnect. "Solstice, Solstice, Solstice, this is Hokule'a do you copy?" No response. I wait a few minutes, call again and again no response. No worries, maybe they are charging batteries with the engine and can't hear the radio, besides they have the coordinates for the next waypoint and we can meet up there.
I tried again a little later and still no response. Then Jackie hears a weak and broken call on the VHF from Solstice. We can only understand about every third word and try to no avail to exchange positions. I grab my backup handheld VHF and hail them but also no response. This means that we have somehow gotten separated by 20+ miles or one of us is having an issue with our radio. Now I am getting a little worried. A few days before leaving La Paz, Bill discovered that his SSB/Ham radio was not working. This radio is the only means of communicating long distances, receiving weather reports, weather faxes, and email. Obviously, receiving weather information is absolutely critical considering that we are making this passage at the start of hurricane season. Bill struggled with possibly delaying the departure until he could have the radio repaired and shipped back to La Paz from the US, but we decided that since we were traveling together, Hokule'a could provide all of the weather information and contact with the outside world to Solstice via our VHF radios. Oh s#&t.
I was still optimistic that we would meet up with them at the first waypoint. But then that doubt creeps in to your head, like what if he gets there first and thinks we left him. What if when I saw them heading south last night , they had decided to go straight to the second way point. What if the waypoint numbers got transposed and they have the wrong waypoint. So Jackie and I decided to turn the motor on and head directly to the way point which was about 8 miles away. Along the way I checked all of the connections to see if there was a problem with Hokulea's radio. Nothing found and again hailed Solstice with no results.
As we approached the waypoint there was no sign of Solstice. So we shut down the engine and hove-to. Hoving-to is a method of stopping the boat and keeping it in a somewhat stationary position. Basically we were parking the boat at the waypoint to wait for Solstice. We hailed Solstice again with no result, but broadcast (just in case they could hear us) that we were hove-to at the first waypoint and would wait for them . While we waited, I decided to try and climb partway up the mast with the binoculars and the handheld VHF to get a better line of sight and signal. Jackie was extremely hesitant about my idea as it was difficult enough to stand up in the cockpit in the 5 to 6 foot seas, much less trying to climb halfway up a 60 foot mast that was whipping around all over the place. After some convincing, she agreed under the condition that I wear my rock climbing harness and attach it to a safety line that she would control at the base of the mast. Off we went and about a third of the way up I started thinking that this wasn't one of my brightest ideas. I was being tossed around like a rag doll, holding on to the mast for dear life, had no idea how I was going to grab the binoculars from around my neck, much less see anything through them and, most importantly, how would I avoid tossing my cookies all over my handheld VHF (and Jackie below me) when I try to hail them. I made it to the first set of spreaders about 25' up and told Jackie that it didn't make any sense to go higher. She tied off my safety line which helped to support me vertically at least.
I scanned the horizon a number of times but could not see Solstice. I hailed them on the radio a couple times with no results, turned off the radio and told Jackie to let me down. As she started to untie the safety line, we hear from the main VHF down below "Hokulea, Hokulea, Hokulea, this is Solstice. Do you copy?" Jackie instinctively re-ties the line and as quickly as she can (on the pitching and rolling deck) makes her way back to the cockpit and down below to the radio. Hey what about me, I shouted. Great, now I am stuck up here even longer banging into the mast with every roll of the boat. After what seemed like an eternity, she came back explaining that she was able to get part of his position but lost the connection. Please just get me down I said. As she started to untie the line again..you guessed it.."Hokulea, Hokulea, Hokulea, do you copy?" Fortunately she finished untying it this time and I could climb down. Me and my bright ideas!
We were finally able to exchange positions and met up with them several hours later on the rhumb line to the next way point. Once again all is well on the high seas!
Tuesday, May 17, 2011
Well, this morning we are about 1100 miles from Cabo. Of course that is measured as a crow flies and we have sailed quite a bit more. Over the last 4 days our nautical miles/day have been Friday 175, Saturday 165, Sunday 135, and Monday 110.
So what was up with Sunday and Monday you ask? Well, Sunday and Monday
were extremely frustrating and exhausting days that truly tested our patience
and at times our marital bliss (just kidding on this part). Late Saturday night the
wind started shifting from out of the north to north east. This made trying to sail
west (as instructed by our weather router) more difficult as it was a deep reach.
As we trimmed our sails for this new wind direction, we found that the boat would
be sailing along fine until a big wave came along. When that happened, Hokule'a
would surf down the wave and start to round up spilling all the wind from her
sails.
Once the wave passed, the sails would fill but with a thunderous bang that
would shake the entire boat. So every 2 or 3 minutes, kaboom then followed by a
small earthquake. I know the sailors in the group are thinking ..well just head the
boat up dummy. Well we did, but now we are heading northwest to Hawaii instead
of the Marquesas and even then with 22 knots of wind and 6-8 foot seas we still
got an occasional kaboom/earthquake. Obviously neither of us slept a wink, and
frustration and exhaustion set in deep. Solstice was having similar issues and we all
decided to head south for a while for a change and some rest, then try to go west again in about 8 hours. Well when we tried to head south we realized that we couldn't sail due south only southeast which means we are heading to South America instead of the Marquesas. All the while the wind couldn't really make up its mind on whether it wanted to blow out of the N, NNE, or NE.
Needless to say I am glad Sunday and Monday are over and we did ultimately make some progress even though it involved numerous course changes and a u-turn or two. I took a photo of our chartplotter showing our sailing track for those days and will insert it here for your entertainment when we get to the Marquesas. Believe it or not we are still learning how to sail this boat and have yet to even fly several of our new sails. I am sure we will have plenty of opportunities in the near future to try out different sail configurations and minimize some of the Sunday/Monday frustrations and those 110 mile days.
Heard from our weather router this morning and he has instructed us to go south now instead of waiting until 130W longitude. I couldn't be happier. The wind has filled in solidly from the NE and sailing conditions look great this morning. Gotta go point the boat south before Jackie gets on watch at 0800. She will be so happy!
Friday, May 13th, 2011
What a difference a day or two makes. As I mentioned last time, we had some
pretty snotty conditions the first two days out of Cabo. But yesterday and today
have had awesome sailing conditions, broad reaching with 15 knots of breeze and
3 foot seas. Our miles per day are down to 155 and 165, but we will gladly take it.
You have probably noticed (on the Where's Hokule'a page) that we are sailing a
bit west of our rhumbline to the Marquesas. That has been the recommendation
of
the professional weather router that we hired for this leg. Yes, there is
another
story there and I will share it once we are at the equator (you know we
sailors
are a superstitious bunch). But that reminds me of the other story
that we can
tell
now that we are out of Mexican waters. I will let Bill elaborate
on the
Solstice
log, but the short version is that one of his new crew for the La
Paz
to Marquesas leg missed their flight and was not going to make it to La Paz
in time to do our
international departure clearance. So instead of hanging around
La Paz another 3 days, we all decided to leave La Paz as planned and basically
smuggle his crew to Cabo where we could get clearance on Monday. Of course, the
first thing we see as we leave the harbor in La Paz is a Mexican Navy vessel that had been stopping and searching vessels.
Our arrival in Cabo on Monday was the antithesis of what we experienced there a few weeks ago. Instead of a peaceful sunrise and breaching humpback whales, we were greeted by about a 100 powerboats of all shapes and sizes coming at us as we prepared to enter the harbor. My first thought was that they had found our about Solstices crew, but quickly learned that it was a shotgun start for a very large fishing tournament. It was a little hairy trying to navigate around all of those boats as we trying to get to the fuel dock.
Cabo had not changed that much since the last time I was there, with the exception of some new hotels, shopping centers, and a Starbucks. It still has that in your face "Have I got a deal for you my friend...". My favorite line this time was "I will give it to you for almost free amigo". The greatest thing about Cabo was that all of the visits to the various government offices necessary for international departure clearance took only 3 hours, compared to our entry that took 3 days in La Paz.
It was already early afternoon, so we decided to wait and head out of Cabo first thing in the morning. We spent a calm night at anchor, although definitely not quiet, as we were entertained by all of the "Sunset Cruise" boats driving through the anchorage blasting 1970's disco music and patrons chanting in unison "Chug! Chug! Chug!" Only to be followed by the bars on the beach with live bands that played until midnight. You gotta love Cabo...
Well I am off to cook dinner. We are having lemon pepper chicken and a salad with whatever fresh vegtables are left. It's calm now, but guaranteed the ocean knows when you are cooking down below and I fully anticipate it to get rough as soon as I set everything on the counter. The other thing the ocean always knows is how to splash you right after you have had a shower and put on clean dry clothes...
Have a good weekend.
Jake.
Wednesday, May 11, 2011
Just a quick note to let you know that we left Cabo yesterday morning bright and early. We took an extra night to catch up on some sleep and to get ready for some anticipated rough weather to start this leg of the trip. 30 minutes after leaving the calm waters of Cabo, we were bashing into 27 knot wind and 5-7 foot seas, so needless to say the first 24 hours were a little uncomfortable. The good news is that we logged a 180 mile day under double reefed main and a 1/3 of the jib. Both boats and crew are doing well and I will update you in the next day or so and tell you a little about our quick trip to Cabo. Jake.