Day 196, Year 1: Another Mahi Mahi–Day 10
Date and Time: Monday, May 1, 2006
Weather: Cloudy Morning Turning Sunny with Scattered Clouds
Air Temperature: Daytime 79 degrees F
Latitude: 06 degrees 05 minutes S
Longitude: 112 degrees 38 minutes W
Location: Passage from Galapagos to the Marquesas, Day 10
Miles to Go: 1577 (~ 160 miles last 24 hours)
Miles to Date: 1370
The winds are still in the 20 to 25 knots range, the seas are still causing us to rock and roll, but we are doing great. We will be at the half-way point sometime tomorrow, so we will have to plan a celebration. Today we caught another small Mahi Mahi so we are all set for dinner tonight. Life is good.
Today was baking day again, but this time I escaped getting burned. By the way, the burn on my leg is doing fine. Anyway, I needed to use up the multitude of ripening bananas, so I made two loaves of banana bread. It is great as a first breakfast and saves on the use of precious cereal. That is something that is very expensive in French Polynesia, so I welcome the banana bread while it lasts. I also made brownies. That will be our treat during night watch. And it was shower day. When you are on a long passage like this one, you do everything you can to conserve water “just in case”. We have the water maker, but you never know when something could go wrong with it. We have plenty of water to get us to the Marquesas if all goes well, but in case of no wind and a motor failure, you really have to make sure you don’t use up your reserves. So we shower only every third day and on those days, I use the shower water to wash any dirty clothes. I use fresh water to rinse the clothes, but using the shower water really saves water and works fine for the wash. So I am sitting here in the cockpit with clean clothes blowing in my face. With all this wind, they will be dry soon and can be taken below.
The sun is setting. There have been clouds on the horizon most evenings, and we have yet to see the green flash. When you watch the sun set over the ocean, you are supposed to see a flash of green light just as the sun sinks below the horizon, but it keeps escaping us. No green flash again tonight. The new moon is high in the sky right now. It will set before midnight, but in a few days as we get closer to the Marquesas, the moon will be filling and not setting until early morning. We will once again have the light of the moon to guide us.
