Captains log: Spinnaker, kaboom!

Date: July 12, 2022

Time: 21:02

Location:28.47.713N / 133.57.012

A picture is worth a thousand words, thus the length of this blog. 

There's probably no need to state the obvious, but just in case, I'm not proof-reading, spell checking, confirming grammar or anything of the like. It's a little raw with a lot of parts hanging out, but who has time to do that stuff when their bumping along the waves, body and legs literally below the water-line in the belly of Solis. Now that's a funny thought, I'm actually writing to you from maybe 1 foot under the sea!

Yesterday we flew the spinnaker for most of the day. It was a beautiful sight and magical for uplifting our moods. It took us from barely bobbing around at 2 knts, to clipping along at about 5. The wind was so soft, yet our sail was full and we gently undulated up and down the blue canvas of sea. Things were even more magical when four scruffy guys were all down in the cabin hanging around the kitchen eating doritos while the boat just sailed itself on autopilot with this enormous sail floating out in front of us. The spinnaker strategy was working out spectacularly well in low winds so we decided to fly this kite well into the night. 

Last night was our first new shift where I went to sleep at 22:00 and Joe and Gene took first watch. The plan was to grab me if anything started to become problematic or they needed my help. Well, I got to call. I think it was just around 00:00 but I leaped out of bed because the wind picked up and we needed to drop the spinnaker. Unfortunately in the moments between me waking up and getting out on deck, the spinnaker had its corner torn off and went flying around the shrouds (the cables holding the mast). Gene, Joe and I quickly coordinated efforts with Gene handling all the lines in the cockpit, while Joe and I handled the work on the deck up front. Nick was not on watch so I think he was in a deep slumber oblivious to all of the action up on deck. 

By the time we had the sailed packed and 90lb wrecking crane of a spinnaker pole tied up, the wind had calmed back down to a floppy 3knts. Nick woke up at 02:00 for his shift and when I woke at 06:00 to relieve him, I thought for sure he would lie back down and get some rest. But no, this guy devours books like a kid sneaking cookies out of the jar. Among the four of us we brought quite a few books. As of todays chat, Gene has read a half a book, Joe read the first chapter of one book, I've read the foreword of three books (thats like 5 pages in total), whereas Nick seems to be pushing onto book 5 or 6 at this point. 

Maybe all these books give Nick his marketing genius, especially when it comes to hot-dogs. But before I dive into that, I'll give some context and let you imagine where we are, but from a perspective that the land-locked readers my better relate to. Image saying to your friends, "hey, let go on a roadtrip across the country". Then all four of you jump into a self contained camping RV. Then it's explained to you that this is not a typical trip. On this special traverse across the country, you'll be driving at a speed of about 5mph for the entire time. Also, you're not allowed to get out of the RV, ever, for any reason. Actually, you'll be wearing a harness and a tether so that you cannot possibly even fall off of this RV. Also, this is a special country of land you'll be crossing. It's the desert, so it will be an endless expanse that seems to go on forever. You'll be enjoying this view, 24 hours per day. And this desert has a lot of rocks, so it will also be extremely bumpy. Have a fun trip! 

on an extremely uplifting note, we had wind from around 06:00 and it's still blowing now 15 hours later. This will I surely be our best day of progress yet.