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"We left Balboa at 14:30 on Friday, and are now about 190 miles out into the Pacific. Most of today we had good wind and sailed pretty fast, but now we're motoring. The problem is that we are crossing the the tropical interconvergence zone (aka the doldrums).
"The perceived wisdom is to head almost south to an Ecuadorian rock, Malpelo Island, to take advantage of a strong favourable current, a distance of 300 miles, and then head on the rhumb line to Galapagos, hoping to have reached the NE trade winds - we will see tomorrow afternoon. It is then 584 miles to Puerto Ayora."
"It's 2200 and I'm on watch, David asleep.
"We've motored all day as still doldrummed. But beautiful weather, and wildlife to keep us engaged - many sea-birds, flying fish, which are an endless delight, and then this afternoon a pod of pilot whales.
"Our position now is 02.12N 84.47W, and tomorrow we will probably cross the equator. As you may know, the tradition is that the skipper should dress up as King Neptune with a paper crown, a trident, and shaving cream on his face (may be a problem with King of Shaves) and has to commit various indignities on the crew, like covering them with tar and feathers and giving them a salt-water enema. Fortunately David and I have previously crossed the equator, and the initiation is only for first-timers - quite a relief to me, especially the enema bit.
"Our ETA Galapagos is after dawn on Thursday, so we're looking forward to that."
"We're still motoring, but there's a suggestion the wind is changing, so there may be better things ahead. ETA Galapagos still Thursday morning.
"The excitement yesterday was when we caught a fantastic fish - 120cm (that's almost 4 foot to some of you) long, though I've no idea what weight. A beautiful opalescent blue/green dorado - we felt terrible killing it. And therein lay a problem. Everyone says the best way to kill a big fish is to put alcohol in its gills; sounds easy, but this monster was thrashing around so much that I chucked over half a bottle of malt on the deck before I managed to get 10ml down its neck. But it worked - I guess it just gives it an anaesthetic to make execution painless."
"We just crossed the equator - I was looking at the outflow from the sink and as we crossed the swirl stopped and started going the other way??????
"Still no wind, but masses of wildlife: plenty of dolphins, and we've seen whales most days since leaving Panama. As usual lots of flying fish, and this morning David found a 5 inch squid on deck - how did that get there?
"We should reach Galapagos midday today."
"We're anchored in Puerto Ayora in Galapagos.
"For once all the hyperbole is justified. The wild-life is mind-blowing. We walked to a beautiful beach this morning with masses of marine iguanas - prehistoric looking creatures up to a metre long, completely unafraid, though rather bad-tempered!
"Yesterday we went to an island for some snorkelling, and there I was minding my own business, looking at the wonderful fish, when suddenly I was surrounded by 20 or 30 sea-lions, all determined to play with me. They would aim for me from about 30 metres away, swim at me at high speed, and then at the last moment, swerve away and dive up out of the water. There's no doubt they were having a whale of a time, know what I mean.
"There are also sensational birds, especially the blue-footed boobies. They hover about 50 metres in the air, and then dive bomb down deep into the water. It is of course swelteringly hot as we are virtually right on the equator - at midday we have more or less no shadow.
"The message we are getting from the boats out ahead is that the Southern Trade winds haven't yet established themselves. Nevertheless, we will probably set off tomorrow morning for the Marquesas - the longest haul we will have on the whole trip, over 3000 miles.
"We had a wonderful surprise when we arrived at Puerto Aroya. We hadn't expected to see Tony and Liz Pearson (who are on a cruise in the area) but they had their itinerary changed and were standing on the deck of their boat when they saw Hygeia come into port: couldn't believe it! They only had 4 hours before their boat set off, but they came on board for a drink, and we had dinner together in town, which was really nice."
"We left Galapagos yesterday at 14:35 in a wonderful 20 knot southeasterly - had a glorious sail through sparkling seas until evening, when the wind dropped. We've motored a bit today, and the forecast for wind isn't very promising.
We had a tiresome couple of hours trying to set up the twistle pole - in the end we gave up and I suggested to David we should go out for dinner. At that point the VHF went, and Angela on Spring Gold, who was a couple of miles away (the only boat for 200 miles) came on to say she had cooked a chicken that was far too big and did we want some? Did we just - beat tinned frankfurters. So she wrapped the food in tin foil, and sent it over in a bucket on a rope. Scrumptious.
Sadly the forecast isn't good for wind - a boat 200 miles ahead of us is considering returning to Galapagos to await the turn in the wind - a bit foolish I would guess."
"Not much news - still no wind, so we've motored most of the day. We remain close to Spring Gold, and I must say it's nice to have company. As we go further south we will eventually enter the trade wind belt. We are still really in the doldrums - physically but not metaphorically!"
"I just went up on deck for a look - mirror-calm sea with wonderful blue phosphorescence in our tumbling bow-wave, and streaming behind in our wake.
"When I flush the heads the loo fills with sparkling diamonds of blue...it's difficult to wax eloquent about your bog!"
"We have had a wonderful day - excellent wind most of the day and we've averaged over 6 knots under sail.
"The wildlife here is just fantastic - we had a school of about 50 dolphins come bouncing past us at high speed, and we usually have a school of about 20-30 iridescent blue-green fish, about 15 inches long keeping station just under our bow, playing in the wave. We also had a large basking shark glide by us this morning. And we had more squid on the deck this morning - we have no idea how they get there! There are also all sorts of birds, none of which I recognise.
"It's now just after 20:00 and David is asleep. We have been through a few squalls this evening but they are now behind us and I have a glorious cloudless sky with a brilliant moon, and the stars are bright in a way you don't see them at home. It's too beautiful for words. I can't believe my good fortune that I'm able to experience it.
"David and I run a some what unorthodox watch system - from Panama to Galapagos we did the usual 3 hours on, 3 hours off. Now we have a beer and our supper at about 17:30, and thereafter it rapidly gets dark. David then goes to bed and I'm on watch until 01:00; he then takes over and I sleep until 06:00. I then take over again and he has a couple more hours sleep until we have breakfast at about 09:00. It seems to work well and we both feel refreshed.
"It's really nice being in company with Spring Gold; I can see their mast- head light about 2 miles away on my starboard bow."
"At 20:15 a NE wind began to set in, AND WE'RE SAILING! YIPPPEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!! - that word may be expensive at 0.5p a character, but you have no idea how good I feel!"
19 March 2000
"We finally hit consistent winds at 19:00 last night, and it looks as if we have entered the trades. We now have a 20 knot wind from the east, and if they hold then we can begin to think of a landfall date - ?around 2/3/4 April if all goes well.
"The Iridium phone still seems to be working - last minute reprieve?"
"Progress here is monitored by evolving landmarks: tonight we pass 1,000 miles from Galapagos. Tomorrow we will be less than 2,000 miles to the Marquesas; the next day we will be halfway from Panama, and a couple of days later it's chart turn-over day. Then we'll be halfway from Galapagos to the Marquesas, before we have only 1,000 miles to go.
"We've now not used the motor for 2 days, so I hope our wind-less days are over. We still have lettuce and tomatoes from Panama, as well as a wonderful watermelon. You'll be pleased to know that we still observe the niceties of civilisation - ie we shave and shower regularly and remain sweet-smelling. The water-maker is undoubtedly one of the most important inventions in improving the lot of small-boat sailors: we make water ever day (if you know what I mean) and the tanks remain full.
"Better go - I have to make supper (oh no, not rice again)."
"Conditions pretty much unchanged, though reports from boats ahead talk of a decline in the wind. We're maintaining regular non-to-noon runs of over 150 miles which we're very happy with.
"We've had no luck with fishing recently. The last fish was so big, and we wasted so much of the flesh as a result, that I've lost my enthusiasm. If we could guarantee a small fish it would be okay, but I would hate to catch another big one and waste so much of it.
"We can no longer see Spring Gold - she's a racing boat and a bit faster, so when the wind built up we suggested they should go ahead at maximum speed, although we were sad to separate. We speak 3 times a day on SSB; they're about 40 miles ahead.
"SSB is fantastic. I'm still talking every morning to Flight of Time who is still in Panama, over 2000 miles away. I also have a daily net with the Calasciones on Lazy Duck who are still in Galapagos, and set their daughters a new puzzle or brain teaser every day. We also have a more local net with five other boats (including Spring Gold) every morning at 09:00. Finally we listen to the Rally fleet who are currently around us (though only 12 boats over about 1,000 miles). So the airwaves are busy.
"We refer to our distance to go in historical or cultural terms: we are now 1812 miles from Nuku Hiva (Tchaikovsky overture), and when we speak to Spring Gold tonight it will be about 1781 miles - probably Mozart's 35th Symphony. Tomorrow will be Handel, and Purcell the following Day. Guess what historical event we're all looking forward to?"
No update so far today (well, they can hardly go sightseeing can they?), so here's a position report:
| Date: | 23 March 2000 | |
| Time | 09:36 | |
| Course: | 261 degrees | |
| Speed: | 9.0 knots | (See below!) |
| Position: | 8 20.88' S | 110 33.28' W |
Since I picked up this position report Kiko has been in touch to let me know that the GPS system that works this out is only accurate to the nearest 5 knots - apparently they are actually doing about 4.5 knots in a light wind.
Nothing much to report. They still have a light breeze, and are making steady progress. Still aiming to reach the Marquesas in early April.
"We've still got fantastic sailing conditions - we've had 20 or so knots of wind from the East South East since 18 March and have been doing over 150 miles daily - good going by any standards. Only 800 miles to go - it seems such a short distance!
"We hope to reach Nuku Hiva next Tuesday."