Day 4
Yesterday we sailed north beyond 59N to just over 60N before changing course towards the Fair Isle Channel between Orkney and Shetland. This was so that we could get a good tack through the channel. Sadly for us, this is a windward trip all the way so far. Maybe we will have a reach across the North Sea? If we ask Neptune kindly?
There has been much talk about tides, planning, and calculations to assess the tide going through the channel. But at the end of the day, we will arrive when we arrive and we can’t change that. We have also been following the grid files closely; strong winds are forecast for our final few days crossing the North Sea. Let’s hope that this does not turn into a gale.
On a more domestic note, cooking has been a theme of this trip with the crew cooking yummy breakfasts and lunches for their watches. We have eaten 8 dozen eggs! Not to forget Manot’s amazing bread and brownies.
The crew are now experienced at reducing sail and manoeuvres are going smoothly. It’s amazing to think back to our departure from Galway and everyone struggling to learn the ropes of this new boat.
On a personal note, it is so good to be back at sea. We are only just getting into the rhythm; it’s going to come to an end far too soon. Can we just keep on going please?
Before crew look forward to making landfall in Norway, we have one more challenge: to cross the North Sea to Norway. Let’s hope we have fair winds.
- Jojo Pickering, Skipper S/Y FALKEN
JoJoPickering
View more passage logs
”For some things, we will never be ready.” - Moana 2
After 852 miles of open ocean sailing, the crew of Falken dropped anchor in Moorea's Cook's Bay—not with a quiet glide in, but surfing down waves in a squall, breaking speed records and cheering each other on through the rain. What started as a plan to "just dip a toe" into offshore sailing turned into something harder to explain: the worse the conditions got, the more alive everyone felt. Turns out the question was never whether the crew was ready—it was whether they even needed to be.
Kauehi conundrum
Kauehi atoll was always on the itinerary—until the forecast made it a gamble not worth taking. Squalls, bommies, a tidal pass, and no clean escape route: sometimes the hardest call in sailing is the one that keeps you out of a place, not in it. The Tuamotus will have to wait.
Hove-to!
Falken is too fast—a problem most sailors would kill for, yet here we are, tacking back and forth across the Pacific just to kill time. A rogue low pressure system south of Tahiti has stolen the trades and scrambled our timing for the tidal window into Kauehi's pass, leaving us hove-to 45 miles short of our target in the Tuamotus. Salt licorice, dream sandwich debates, and a philosophical question about mermaid reproduction are helping pass the night.