Wednesday. Powering in to Okoe Bay, Kona Coast, Big Island. ETA 8PM
Moku pe'a departed Electric Beach at 6AM on Tuesday morning and headed south past Barbers Point. The trade winds filled in as forecast, and with single reefed main and jib we close reached out into the Molokai Channel. Surprisingly, the wind died off in the lee of Molokai just after noon, and we motor sailed until we entered the Alenuihaha Channel at midnight.
We saw half a dozen bright orange twenty foot long sailing drones spread out over Penguin Banks west of Molokai. Does anybody know what they are doing out there?
The Alenuihaha Channel lived up to its reputation. We had 25 knots of wind but soldiered through with double reefed main and jib. A couple of waves made it under the dodger and down our shirts, but it wasn't as rough as I've seen it in the past.
At 6AM this morning we sailed out of the channel and into the notorious Kona flats where the engine came on and has been on ever since. This is one area we knew we'd be powering.
At 9AM I looked up and saw a FAD buoy directly ahead of us 200 yards off. We had to alter course to miss it. Good thing I looked. We were more than 30 miles off shore and didn't expect to have to avoid anything out here. I had a fishing line out as we passed the buoy and we could see fish feeding on the surface, but nothing took the bait.
We are racing to get into Okoe before dark tonight, but no worries if we don't. Matt Dyer and I anchored in Okoe in pitch blackness when we arrived there from Tahiti on Moku pe'a in 2011. We can do it again if we need to.
Sorry I didn't provide details on the boom repair earlier. Mike Malone built a 20" long custom aluminum sleeve that fit snugly inside the boom and overlapped 10" on each side of the break. Then he put the boom back together and welded it at the break. It looks great, and appears to be stronger than the original.
I'm a little bit worried about Michael. He has grown extremely fond of his "Dutch Wife", a four foot long pillow, that shares his bunk. This morning he asked me, as the ship's captain, to officially marry the two of them. I haven't heard him whispering sweet nothings to her/it yet, but I expect that will come with time.
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