AIRMAIL YOTREPS
IDENT: N6ABC
TIME: 2016/05/07 18:02
LATITUDE: 08-00.99S
LONGITUDE: 117-40.07W
COURSE: 277T
SPEED: 8.0
MARINE: YES
WIND_SPEED: 19
WIND_DIR: ESE
WAVE_HT: 0.3M
WAVE_PER: 5
SWELL_DIR: ESE
SWELL_HT: 2.7M
SWELL_PER: 2
CLOUDS: 20%
VISIBILITY: 15
BARO: 1015.1
AIR_TEMP: 30.6C
COMMENT: Beach House – En Route – Marquesas Islands – Day 11 – 167 nm (took the day off!…:-)
Yesterday we expected more wind than we got and as such, sort of took the day off. We would have easily gone over average, but we just decided
\”Today, we\’ll have an easy day\”. We kept in the mainsail reef and the genoa poled out to the windward side. The weather has turned fair again, puffy cumulus are back, the gray rainy skies gone and sunny sailboat ride is back – at least for now.
We\’ve left our reef in the main, but put the big reacher up on the pole to windward. It\’s about 50% bigger than our genoa. A bit tricky as it\’s 2/3rds the size of our spinnaker too, but has to be \”tacked\” at the deck. We\’re using our \”floating tack\” to accomplish this. I\’ll write it up in the big blog when we get to the internet. As such, we\’re going faster again, not as fast as the spinnaker, but this sail is very easy to put away in two minutes if we needed too.
We see more wind on the horizon for where we expect to be tomorrow and the squalls seem to have moved to the north. The new winds will last for about 3 days, but the end of the trip appears that we\’ll be back in quite light winds. Strategically, we\’re staying more north now so when the winds do quiet down, we can maintain boat speed by reaching across the lighter air which will be from the due East (we\’re heading due West) and keeping the \”apparent wind\” up.
For those of you who aren\’t sailors, the \”apparent wind\” is what we really sail, not the \”true wind\”. The True Wind is the direction and strength the wind actually is. The Apparent Wind is what we sense in our sails. My best example that you\’d be familiar with is a car. If you\’re going 50 miles/hour and the wind is from behind you at 50 miles/hour, the true wind is 50 miles an hour, but the apparent wind to your hand out the window would be ZERO. Your car and wind, traveling in the same direction at the same speed \”feel\” nothing. If you\’re heading INTO that wind, the car at 50 mph – your hand would \”feel\” 100 mph. The example is extreme of course, but on the boat, 2-4 knots of \”apparent wind\” make all the difference in our sailing speed.
We\’re now in the midst of the back of the group of boats that was in front of us, so we\’re hearing their radio reports clearly now.
So far, so good. It\’s been a great passage to date. Let\’s hope it stays that way!
KIT, More tomorrow.
Scott and Nikki – 1240 miles to go.