Saturday November 18, 2000 en route Opua

Light winds again overnight and we were really just drifting as Vlad let Paula sleep from 0400 til 0700. Then we turned on the motor and were able to motorsail although a shift of the wind further south and west just after we had passed through a band of cloud made it slower going. During the calm period, a stream of man o’war jellyfish came floating past the boat, blue combs bobbing along in the current.

And of course, we have to find time for things like meals, cleaning, log keeping, birdwatching etc. Actually all this weather talk gets to be a bit much after a while. There is only so much one can do after all, when one travels at a maximum speed of about 5.5 miles per hour (and often a lot less). On the other hand, We are glad we have the weather fax rather than having to listen to and try to interpret the high seas analysis from the radio. (Or worse yet, rely on other cruisers as so many seem to do.)

In any case, the present consensus (as of Saturday 1100) is that we will have good weather for the next two or three days and that the winds forecast for Wednesday might be less strong than originally predicted. Vlad has been trying to receive the Navy weather charts from Bob on Seafarer’s Net but has not yet succeeded.

We made contact with AMALTHEA during one of the nets. They are doing well, enjoying the passage, which has certainly had good weather if a bit too much motoring so far. Milan is enjoying Adrian’s baking. She certainly makes great cakes!

The checkins at Russell Radio and Seafarers Net is a position and local weather report. The format of the report is:

Report time in UTC (Universal Coordinated Time), Position (Latitude/Longitude), Course steered (True), Boat speed, Wind direction and speed, Sea swell height and direction, Sky cloud cover and barometer. Other observations and comments are added as well as any marine mammal sightings. The Seafarers Net posts boat positions on their internet site and Russell Radio contacts NZ Customs as the boats get closer to NZ.

There is added safety at sea by reporting daily positions. In the U.S. the Seafarers Net will contact the Coast Guard if boats fail to report after several days, and Russell Radio will do the same with NZ authorities. There is also weather, technical, and medical help available when necessary. The Seafarers Net is a volunteer HAM organization with net controllers on the west coast of the U.S., Hawaii and NZ. Russell Radio is a one man operation on SSB frequencies out of Russell NZ. The DDD net is a Canadian HAM net associated with the Bluewater Cruising Association. The Coconut Milkrun Net is a local cruisers net of boats cruising in the Pacific.