baptism of fire
January 7, 2025, 23:45 UTC | Baptism of Fire
Well, that was a breezy start with some impressive swell on the good ship FALKEN on Monday. A baptism of fire perhaps for some, as we made excellent time southeast ahead of the impending high pressure that would invariably cause us issues later. We chose a route east of our planned rhumb line to exploit the forecasted easterlies off the coast of Morocco, and sure enough, it enabled us to sail for most of Tuesday.
As expected, the high has now emerged and we are forced to utilize the iron sail as we make best speed south. To the west of us, another interesting system is driving strong southwesterlies, and we are expecting to see the swell increase again in the coming days.
Another tactical waypoint guides us to the north of Lanzarote, where the trusty northeasterlies promise to build on Thursday morning and hopefully will provide another impressive sail at the back end of our passage. The crew have settled in well despite a little seasickness in the first 24 hours, which is pretty standard. Thankfully, this evening we had a full house at dinner time as color appears to have returned to those initially impacted.
We have been delighted by dolphins and a spectacular sky of stars last night, both of which have lifted the spirits of the crew. Whilst nobody wants to be motor sailing, we have the promise of a stiff breeze to look forward to as we make our approaches to the Canary Island chain.
Emily
EmilyCaruso
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Quadruple digits!
We are still headed north away from Hawaii, though today we have started to veer ever so slightly east. Speaking of miles, we hit quadruple digits today and are currently 1051 nms into our journey to Alaska. The sea state continues to calm down, and the famous North Pacific high is just out of our reach. The next few days will be a delicate dance of riding the outskirts of the high while avoiding the pesky low pressure systems that are dancing nearby. In his very wise words, we need to get north but not too far north, stay south but not too far south, continue heading east but not too far east, and avoid going west but also stay west.
The basics
Nordic Falken and her crew have been in a steady course of NNW since the departure of Hawaii. But! The good thing of all of this is that the promised land on which the high pressure lies has been getting closer and closer, meaning in a couple of days we're gonna see the wind slowly veer all the way to the South, which finally should see us easing the sails and remembering the basics of human nature all over again. The crew have been amazing and we've had everyone come around to push through fatigue, seasickness and soaking wet clothes. On another note we left the tropics a while ago and we can really feel the shift of temperature, long gone are the shorts and foulies have been the norm. Not much more apart from this, my intolerance to upwind sailing still pretty much alive but doing it with a bunch of such amazing human beings makes it worth it worthwhile.
Pacific pace
After some initial adversity, we untied our lines and left the beautiful island of O'ahu behind as we set sail north on an adventure of a lifetime. And that is exactly what we are - a family of strangers brought together by a passion for sailing and a love for the sea. The passage, while at its infancy, has delivered. The wind and seas, stars and sails all set the stage for a fantastic journey. We will see you on the other side with many stories to tell.