Puerto Ayora
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| Santa Cruz |
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| Robert |
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| John, Sue, Tim, Ceci |
Captain’s Observation
3/16/15
6:10 UTC
7.5.9305 S
101.15.38 W
It is now six days since Daphne shipped over to our friend’s boat Tahawus to open up a berth for incoming crew, Robert Coles and since Ceci flew home for her family reunion and to tend to other matters.
Last days in Porto Ayora filled with provisioning, sightseeing, drinks and dinners with
good friends from fleet boats. Some 1200 miles out, I don’t miss the noise and commotion of the water taxis in the harbor or their constant to and fro between the town dock and the many mini cruise ships that come and go.
Pto. Ayora is a busy, busy place. Many tourists, many tourist shops, many sight-seeing tour operators. Interesting to visit, don’t need to visit again. It took several washes and a few rains to rid the boat of the fine, red, oily volcanic ash that one tracks on board or is simply blown off of the dusty streets.
Crew is settling in nicely. Ransom’s systems still throwing us enough challenges to keep the brain, hands and tools engaged. Recent events include a mini flood of forward head caused by broken grey water pump, masterfully replaced by Pip. Good thing we had a spare on board, another one coming.
Generator is working but not charging batteries (important to have out here; otherwise, there is no fresh water, refrigeration, lights or navigation instruments), thankfully engine house battery charger was repaired (twice) in Panama City. Large Genoa halyard had chafed through about 60% at head.
Glad we caught it before the halyard parted, and this rather large sail got wrapped around the keel and prop, and the halyard disappeared down the mast. We are sewing an anti-chafe sleeve on the halyard where it passes through the mast head. A major disaster avoided. All halyards will be replaced in Tahiti with a line called Spectra; UV resistant, doesn’t stretch, doesn’t chafe. SSB radio is not transmitting with enough strength. I emailed my radio tech who is currently in China working on boats. He thinks he has a solution for the problem and will email it to me, simply amazing. Rain has found its way through the hatch over my berth, something to fix tomorrow if it isn’t raining. So far, we are keeping up with the gremlins. Ceci will be bringing in a large box of spare and replacement parts.
With only three on board the watch rhythm changes. Off watch crew mostly sleeps and reads when we are not fixing things. Not much time for games, movies and the like.
Weather and wind have not been as expected. We and others sailed South from the Galapagos in search of wind and instead found a huge void of confused and bumpy seas, shifting winds, fog and occasional rain. We had two days of favorable winds and covered some ground, but it does not look promising for later in the week.
The fleet is well spread out. First boat to last is probably 300 miles. We try to share or positions and conditions with each other on the ssb ”net” in the evening, but radio reception has been poor, so we email same into a coordinating boat.
We have been sailing in the company of our friends on board Libby, an Amel 53 ketch. It’s nice to have someone else to share the day’s events with. For the past six days, they have been within six miles of us but it now looks as they are pulling way ahead of us and changing course getting ready to deploy their Argo weather buoys for NOAA.
We will be dropping our drifter weather buoy at 102 West, about 24 hours from now.
We don’t spend too much time calculating or thinking about the distance and time to the Marquesas, it is a long way to go.
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| Argo weather buoy for NOAA. |
Ceci is thinking about coming out before Tahiti, so she can see the Marquesas and Tuamotos, apparently the most beautiful, serene and sparsely populated of South Pacific cruising grounds.
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