DAY 4
Spinnaker day! After an extremely peaceful night ghosting along the southern coast of Portugal amongst electric dolphins and under a blanket of stars, FALKEN enjoyed a day of building breezes and a chance to stretch our legs downwind. Shortly after sunrise, we jibed the ship onto starboard tack and headed SSW. I was conscious of not heading too far west and towards Gibraltar, where all the recent orca encounters have been. In fact, if I’d had a choice, we’d have sailed west and out into the Atlantic from Sagres, not going anywhere near Gibraltar at all. Alas, that elongated ridge of high pressure was centered just offshore Sao Vincente, and so if we wanted to sail, we needed wind, and the wind was to the east.
Alex & Mia came on deck to lead the crew in hoisting the big pink kite. Everything takes ten times longer with new crew on the first try, but out here we have nothing but time, so it took the time it needed to get everything set right. With Mia on the helm, we pulled the downline on the sock and the 3,000-sq.ft. S2 opened up in the breeze and FALKEN surged ahead.
We spent the day sailing under the chute, dousing it before dinnertime and getting all the lines and gear stowed for the night. It’s November, and while it’s nice and warm here off southern Portugal, the nights are long. It gets dark around 1730 and doesn’t get light again until around 0700, so the night watches are long. But the stargazing more than makes up for it. We passed around the binoculars last night, taking turns looking at Orion’s belt and the millions of stars in the background that you’d never see ashore.
At sunrise today, we sheeted in the sails and tacked. Now we’re close-hauled, aiming ENE and starting the long upwind slog back towards Lagos. We’re taking bets on how many miles we’ll actually sail, since we have to tack upwind. It’s about 100 miles in a straight line, but we’ll do many more than that against the wind. It’s a light wind though, and very pleasant out here! — Andy
andy@59-north.com
View more passage logs
Ladies who reef
The trade winds have been kind, rolling the boat toward Hawaii in a steady, hypnotic rhythm—until last night, when a squall hit without warning and the wind jumped to 28 knots, slamming everything sideways. With rain driving down and the boat lurching underfoot, the crew had minutes to wrestle two reefs into the mainsail and get things back under control. What followed was a masterclass in wet, unglamorous, deeply satisfying teamwork—with less than 250 miles left to go.
Yankee Doodle Died at Sea, Riding on a FALKEN
A thin, foot-long tear in the yankee sail—50,000 miles of ocean behind it—and suddenly the final stretch to Hawaii just got a lot more interesting. The crew of FALKEN had been running a tight ship through the trades, reefing in squalls like clockwork, when the last dance finally caught up with them. How a skipper handles the moment everything goes sideways says everything about the voyage itself.
A Gen Z Perspective
At 31, the crew thought they were reasonably fluent in the English language—then they met Kip. Today, the crew's self-appointed Gen Z correspondent takes over the log from somewhere in the middle of the Pacific, delivering dispatches on Milky Way night sails, focaccia-induced visions, and the singular mission of getting eleven people's "badonkadonks" to Hawaii. Consider this your glossary.