Catching Up - The Lost Blogs

As you may be aware, the Mighty Moku pe'a has been without sat phone email capabilities since 4 November. We've been trying to make it work every day without success. Then today, 12 November, it started working again for no apparent reason. What follows are the blogs for 4-12 November. Sorry about the SNAFU.

4 November - A Sad Day 0600 position 2-03S 149-18W. 879 miles north of Bora Bora, 1,353 miles south of Hilo. Day's run 165 miles.

The mood aboard Moku pe'a was subdued today. Rocky, my friend and shipmate for the longest leg of this adventure, lost his son on Saturday. It is incomprehensible what a parent must go through in such a situation. Our hearts go out to Rocky and his family and we can only try to will them the strength to carry on.

After 2 days of northeasterlies the wind started to clock as forecast and lifted us up to our desired heading just east of north. We've started to ease sheets and have moved the jib lead out to the rail. The wind is steady at about ten knots. Our speed has picked up and we are consistently sailing between six and seven knots. The seas are flat and there are no squalls. It doesn't get any nicer than this out here. We should have these conditions for another day before the wind lightens and continues to lift us, and then we will probably have to head up to the northeast to maintain speed. Other than
the expected fluky winds in the ITCZ, it should be all downhill from here into Hilo.

We are about five days away from the southern edge of the ITCZ, or doldrums. The ITCZ is poorly organized and 250 miles wide right now in the area where we need to cross it, and it could take us a few days to get through. Let's hope the forecasts become more favorable as we get nearer to it.

There was quite a bit of marine life out here today. Tony had some dolphin playing in the bow wave last night. We sailed by a bird pile working some bait fish on the surface just after noon. I had what looked like an aku hit the fish line this afternoon. The hook didn't set so I went to pull the line in to check the lure for damage when he hit a second time, but again the hook didn't set. Just as well. I don't care much for aku. A little later another fish hit but didn't hook up. Once again I was pulling the line in when it hit again. This time I could see the dorsal fin of a small billfish so I got the line in quickly. Don't want those guys messing with my lures. On my Ranger 33 Eleu off of the Marquesas I watched mesmerized as a single marlin took four of my lures one at a time before I wised up and pulled in the fifth handline intact.

5 November - Crossing the Line 0600 position 0-23 N 148-36W. 1,030 miles north of Bora Bora, 1,224 miles south of Hilo. Day's run 152 miles.

At 229AM I was sitting in the cockpit enjoying my morning cup of coffee and contemplating life when I heard a "thump" up near the bow pulpit. I looked up, and in the nearly full moonlight could clearly see the silhouette of a crowned, long haired old man armed with a trident balancing miraculously on the foredeck as the boat pitched in the small but confused seas. "Uh oh. Here we go!" I thought. He stomped aft along the deck leaving a trail of disgusting smelly seaweed for me
to clean up later.

I stood as he entered the cockpit and he bellowed "By the blood of Poseidon, can't you manage to cross the equator at a civilized hour? I was just getting busy with the misses! I hope you've got a good reason for interrupting me!"

"Greetings, Your Majesty," I said. "Welcome aboard. I am truly sorry about the hour, but we can't control what time we get here. We are at the mercy of the winds and seas, and that's your department."

"Hmmm, so it is," replied the Sea King. "But Moku pe'a crossing the line AGAIN! Don't you guys have anything better to do?"

"Your seas are the finest spots on the earth, Your Highness," I pleaded. "There is no place we'd rather be."

This seemed to placate the old bastard, and after a moment of thought he said "So it feels like there's a pollywog aboard. Where is he?"

Tony had, in fact, been awakened by all of the commotion, and came sheepishly on deck. "Good morning, O' Great Sea Lord. I'm honored to be in your presence," said Tony, clearly sucking up to King Neptune.

"Good morning, indeed" responded the crusty codger. "And why should I allow you into the realm?"

I jumped to Tony's defense. "Tony is a fine sailor," I stated. "He has crossed your ocean many times under sail and has the greatest respect for your winds, waves, and creatures… and he likes the BeeGees."

The Sea King now eyed Tony warily. Perhaps it was the BeeGees comment that had taken him aback. He was probably wondering if Tony was psycho and decided to handle him with kid gloves. "Uh, OK. Welcome to the Kingdom. Let it be known by all that Tony is now a Shellback and hereby entitled to all of the benefits of Shellbackdom!"

With the expected business concluded I thought His Royal Highness would make his departure, but we all stood around looking at each other in an awkward silence. I finally broke the ice by asking, "Can I get you a drink, Your Majesty? Perhaps a shrimp cocktail?"

"No thanks, Skipper," he replied, "but there is something else. My records indicate that this is your tenth equator crossing under sail, and I want you to know that you have just joined a pretty exclusive club."

"Does the club have a name, Your Highness?", I asked, hoping that it didn't include the words "idiots", "morons", or "fools".

"Nope," he said, "Just wanted to acknowledge your accomplishment."

"This wouldn't have anything to do with the remarkable weather you gave us for the Vava'u to Raivavae passage, would it?" I queried.

"In part," answered the Sea King. "Also, it is widely known that Moku pe'a is a fine vessel. She always does her best, has risen to every challenge, and never lets you down. She has earned a break, and I wanted to take it easy on the old girl."

"She is a grand lady and has been a faithful partner in my adventures these past ten years," I opined. "Thank you for taking care of her."

With that, the Lord of the Seas slipped over the side and was gone. I wondered if that was the last time we would meet.

6 November -A Different Point of View 0600 position 4-42S 149-58W. 715 miles north of Bora Bora, 1,499 miles south of Hilo. Day's run 138 miles.

Tony had a little bit different take on the equator crossing. Here it is:

A couple of nights ago, I was sleeping peacefully, Moku pe'a's gentle rolling and the the sluicing of the ocean inches from my ear providing a lullaby. Suddenly, there was a huge commotion out on deck. An unrecognizable clamor accompanied by a thundering voice to be heard intermixed with Noodle's quieter tone. The booming voice was saying, "How DARE you! Where is he! Where is he! Noodle, you know me well enough! Any Pollywogs that enter my realm must have my PERMISSION to pass! Place him before me IMMEDIATELY!"

I rubbed the sleep from my eyes and hurried to the waist of our little ship. Silhouetted in the shaft of silvery moonlight that sparkled on the water was the most imposing figure I've ever seen. He was extremely tall, every bit as old and crusty as I had imagined. He was draped in some kind of cloak of ripply material that dripped seawater. He certainly smelled to high heaven! He wore a huge crown that made him look the more imposing, and he carried the most lethal looking trident. The crown and trident emitted a soft metallic rattling sound in the trade wind. Of all his frightening features, the strangest was a single glowing eye in the middle of his forehead. The great Neptune himself! "There you are, you scrawny little Pollywog!" he boomed, the salt spray showering from his lips. "How DARE you enter my realm without my permission! Justify yourself to me IMMEDIATELY!"

I trembled from head to toe, believing that at any second, he would make sashimi of me with that vicious trident. I stammered, "Oh Great Neptune, please forgive my intrusion. All my life I have been wanting to become a Shellback. I have traversed your seas and marveled at your creations. I have benefited from your generosity and suffered from your wrath. I humbly beg of you, sir, that you accept me into your realm as Shellback so that I my leave behind my inferior status as Pollywog."

"Pppfftthhh!" he spluttered. "Scant reason for me to accept you into my great realm." But his tone was softening a bit. "Noodle you and I have known each other for many years. Is this quivering bit of ogo limu truely worthy?"

Noodle listed off some of my limited ocean experience, embellishing a little, and explained that he thought my heart was ready. The old man's tone soften slightly more. "Aaack, Noodle, I'm inclined to turn him down. I see too many of these unworthy scabs wishing to enter my realm these days."

Noodle looked him square in the eye and said, "Sir, he really does have the beginnings of seawater coursing through his veins, and he loves it out here in your realm. Just look at that silly grin on his face, despite his terror of becoming sushi at any moment. Besides, he actually likes the Beegees."

"Oh, for crying out low. All right then," he grumbled. He turned to me. "Since Noodle and I go way back and he vouches for you, and since you have been wanting to cross the equator by sailboat all your life and have been working towards it, and since you are old and probably could not cause me much trouble anyway, I accept you, finally, into my realm as Shellback," he growled. "You may forever leave behind your status a Pollyiwog. But don't screw it up!"

Elated, I scurried below to ponder my new status. I was relieved I had not become nigiri appetizer for Neptune's family. As I left, I heard the old man and Noodle discussing a tenth (!) equator crossing and the last odd words, "Have you heard about their latest comeback tour...?"

If you don't believe the great King Neptune himself actually visited Moku pe'a, I have video.

And that's how Tony saw it…..

We have been unable to exchange email over the sat phone for two days now, and it is frustrating. When we try, and we have tried often, we get the error message "Temporary Network Error - Please Try Again Later". The phone works fine for voice transmissions as I've spoken to Lori twice. Hopefully we can get this worked out. I know there are folks who look forward to reading this with their morning coffee.

The past few days have been glorious sailing. Flat water, close reaching, light air but just enough to keep us sailing at full speed, and all in the right direction. We have gone full watches without adjusting heading or sails at all. Unfortunately that came to an end just after I came on watch at midnight last night. The wind had been dying during Tony's evening watch and it crapped out completely during mine. The engine went on at 125AM and we have been under power ever
since. The last grib we got said that the wind should clock around to the south, but not die off completely.

Just before we crossed the equator Tony saw what I believe was the first ship of the entire cruise during his morning watch, a container ship heading south. Tony decided that it was probably on the LA to Papeete run based on it's location, heading, and configuration.

At 10PM we passed the half way point in the voyage. It is all downhill from here!

There has been quite a bit of sea life out here around the equator. Both Tony and I had dolphins playing by the boat during our evening watches. I hooked a couple of tuna during my afternoon watch, but they came off before I could boat them. I've also seen tuna jumping close to the boat chasing prey. There are more birds about than there were earlier in the passage.

7 November - Moku pe'a Only Sails Downwind 0600 position 5-34N 147-43W. 1,346 miles north of Bora Bora, 955 miles south of Hilo. Day's run 166 miles.

The wind started to fill in from the south, so at 6AM we set the spinnaker and shut the engine down after five hours of powering. The spinnaker stayed up until shortly after noon when a large squall looked like it was going to hit us. We did the conservative thing and dropped the kite. The squall ended up missing us, but the wind was increasing so we poled out the jib and kept charging along until 6PM when the wind came forward a bit and we got rid of the pole. Tony sailed his night watch under full sail, but the wind increased during my night watch and by the time Tony came on deck in the morning we had two reefs in the mainsail and one in the jib.

Just after noon we sailed through the most distinct and turbulent current line I have ever seen at sea. I was lucky enough to capture it on video. The nearest land was more than 500 miles away. Perhaps it was the southern edge of the equatorial counter current.

During my night watch I could see lightning in the northwest. Perhaps the ITCZ?

8 November - Heading for the Barn 0600 position 5-34N 147-43W. 1,346 miles north of Bora Bora, 955 miles south of Hilo. Day's run 166 miles.

We sailed as deep as we could on starboard tack all morning, and then poled out the jib at noon. We had a double reef in the main all day, and 2 reefs in the jib in the squalls, with a full jib in between. Just after Tony came up for his early evening watch it started to rain, and it rained almost continuously all night. Tony complained that his hands were so wet for so long that the skin was pealing off. I was chilled to the bone and had on my hoodie sweatshirt under my foul weather
gear. It was continuous squalls all night long, with wind strength varying from nothing to 20 knots and sixty degree shifts. It required constant attention since we had the jib poled out first on starboard tack during Tony's watch, and then we jybed at midnight and I sailed my entire night watch on port tack.

Our progress is remarkable considering we are spending a lot of time parked up during the lulls. Moku pe'a feels like a horse that is headed for the barn. She is probably as anxious to get home as I am.

9 November - In the Zone 10-09N 146-47W. 1,627 miles north of Bora Bora, 752 miles south of Hilo. Day's run 117 miles.

We continued running in light air during Tony's morning watch, but the wind was slowly dying off. By the time I came on watch at noon it had crapped out completely. We ran the engine for twenty minutes in the early afternoon, but then the wind filled in from the west, and we sailed until 3PM when it died again. Engine on for three hours and when Tony came up at 6PM it filled from the east. The seas died off at the same time, and Tony had a gorgeous light air reach in flat seas and full moon for his evening watch.

We were caught in the equatorial counter current all day. In the middle of the stream we were headed due north, but our track over the bottom was twenty three degrees. That's quite a current! It also made the seas bumpy and confused. As we got further north, the current velocity decreased, the choppy seas decreased, and our track over the bottom slowly returned to due north. Interesting to see it on the chart plotter. Our compass course was true north all day but our track is a large arc.

We are starting to get concerned about our fuel consumption. The full day of powering at the beginning of the trip didn't help. We siphoned our spare jerry jug into the tank this afternoon, and that leaves us with about twelve gallons. That's not enough to power all the way through the ITCZ. Hopefully this wind continues.

Tony had a dream the other night that he and I were sailing with a saucy young French girl in cutoff jeans. She was joking around and laughing with us. Her name was Moku pe'a.

10 November - Heaven on Earth 11-58N 147-27W. 1,727 miles north of Bora Bora, 644 miles south of Hilo. Day's run 116 miles.

Eight to twelve degrees north latitude is the heart of the ITCZ. It is usually miserable here with thunderstorms, sloppy and confused seas and wind from all directions. We've been under power for the last two hours after the wind died, but for the previous thirty four hours we enjoyed some of the most beautiful sailing ever. Close reaching in absolutely calm seas, four to eight knots of breeze, dolphins playing under the bow, full moon at night, some interesting clouds but no rain. We're not breaking any speed records, but we are making good progress. For a whole day the wind was out of the east allowing us to sail directly north. Then over a ten minute period at 440PM today the wind slowly backed to just east of north, knocking us down until we were aimed right at Hilo. It looks like we may be out of the ITCZ, but this recent calm concerns me. Time will tell.

It was fascinating to see how the current has affected us. Our compass heading from 8AM yesterday until 440PM today was directly north. Our track over the bottom for that period looks like a large even arc though, with a heading of 026 degrees true at the southern end and 346 degrees at the northern end. This was all caused by current, first the equatorial counter current which sets to the east, and then that disappeared at 10N and was replaced by the normal tropical Pacific Ocean
westerly set. By my calculations there was two knots of easterly set in the south which slowly died and was replaced by a one knot westerly set in the north.

We're still on our first of two fifty gallon water tanks and since we are two thirds of the way to Hilo, I decided we could be a little more lax on the use of fresh water. There was still some hot water in the tank from all the powering we did yesterday, so I took a hot shower this afternoon. So nice. I'm looking forward to those regularly at home.

The winds were light but steady during my afternoon watch so I spent the time doing boat projects. I repaired the foot of the jib that had chafed, defrosted the refrigerator, rebuilt some damaged lures and cleaned and reorganized the lure quiver.

11 November - Slow Going 13-12N 148-37W. 1791 miles north of Bora Bora, 542 miles southeast of Hilo. Day's run 101 miles.

At sunrise yesterday I could see small tuna jumping and feeding all around the boat. We're talking six inch long tuna. The sea was very flat so you could see them a long way from the boat. They continued jumping and feeding until sunset. I put the lures out since I thought there might be something bigger out there. The little tuna must have had a laugh at my lure selection. We've caught so few fish that I'm trying everything including some old homemade plugs I put together forty years ago.

The wind teased us all day long but kept dying and we ended up powering three times for a total of nine hours. We would have powered even longer, but we only have enough fuel left for about twenty hours of powering, and we need to conserve fuel. The wind finally filled in from the northwest, the direction of Hilo, at 6PM. We tried both tacks and settled on port as being a bit closer to the mark. Over the course of Tony's night watch the wind slowly lifted us until we were almost laying Hilo when I came on watch at midnight. Nothing changed during my night watch.

12 November - Trade Winds At Last! 15-02N 150-35W. 1791 miles north of Bora Bora, 542 miles southeast of Hilo. Day's run 159 miles.

The ITCZ is characterized by large confused seas, constantly variable winds but mostly calm, rain, thunder and lightning. It is usually found between latitudes 8N and 12N. In my ten Pacific equator crossings the ITCZ has never been the same twice. It has varied in severity from 2 hours/12 miles wide to 4 days/240 miles wide. This ITCZ crossing was a strange one. We had typical conditions for about 9 hours/40 miles at 9N, but then we had smooth seas, clear skies, and steady easterly winds for 36 hours/120 miles. I speculated that we might be through the ITCZ at that point, but it wasn't to be.
We then had another 36 hours/120 miles of light and variable winds with smooth seas and clear skies before the NE trades finally filled in at 6PM yesterday. So the total width of the ITCZ this time was 3+ days/280 miles, but most of it was atypically pleasant. It is always and interesting experience.

We have been thundering along since the trades filled in yesterday. The winds have built slowly to about fifteen knots, and we don't expect them to get any stronger. Lori is giving us voice forecasts over the sat phone that she has extracted from the gribs for our expected location the rest of the way into Hilo. The winds should slowly lift us and lighten a bit allowing us to ease sheets and have a pleasant reach the rest of the way in.

We are down to about a quarter tank of fuel left. That's enough for about ten hours more powering before we'd have to shut down to ensure we have enough left to enter Hilo harbor. Fortunately, the forecast indicates no more powering will be necessary before we make landfall. We'll be able to get more fuel in Hilo.

The little tuna are still jumping everywhere. There is much speculation aboard about the Mighty Moku pe'a about why there are so many and why they are so small. Yesterday's theory was over fishing of large tuna left lots of tuna prey which has resulted in a baby boom. Tony has had a lot of spare time to think about this, too much spare time, and today he theorized that the same few tuna have been with the boat the whole time. He claims he recognizes them individually and has given some of them names. He says if we catch one we can tell because it will have a Bora Bora Yacht Club T shirt on. I have my doubts. We've gone 175 miles in the thirty six hours since we first sighted them. I don't think they could keep up with the boat for that long, and why would they want to? Are they going to Hilo too? Don't fish have to sleep? How can they follow us if they are asleep? Also, we can see them feeding constantly as they jump after prey. They'd have to be able to digest food as fast as a food processor to be the same fish. Any other theories?