Day 4 at-sea
Day 4
We are all now falling into the regular routine of life at sea—the times of our different watches, the writing up of the hourly log, and the drinking of coffee. On this trip, there has been a lot of coffee drinking. Everyone’s appetites have improved as we have found our sea legs, and we all want it to carry on for longer.
We had another perfect sailing night followed by a spectacular sunrise, helped by the Sahara dust brought in by the easterly wind. At 1146 UTC, we passed our 600 NM point on the trip with just 170 NM to go, so we hope to arrive at about midday tomorrow.
Skipper Alex has positioned us to the east of Lanzarote to take advantage of the southeast wind, which will push us towards Las Palmas and our end destination. We started the day broad reaching with easterly wind, then at about 1330 the wind veered to the southeast and we hauled in the sails to a close reach. Sailing along smoothly at 8–9 knots. What a fabulous ride.
Jojo
JoJoPickering
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Ketch us if you Kan
Falken is soon to carry on our preferred route of South, back to (hopefully) warmer climates. We’re all excited to set off and see more of this wild landscape as we head down to Victoria. A thermal trough over Vancouver combined with an offshore high pressure creating funneling NW’ly winds means it is due to be pretty fruity on the 9th. This passage is just under 600 miles, relatively short for Falken, but I’m sure we’ll be kept entertained with dramatic scenery, wildlife and weather!
Final Blog
Falken and her crew arrived safely into port last night around 8pm boat time, 10pm Prince Rupert time. Some spicy weather was anticipated, but luckily the 35kt gusts and 2.5 meter waves were no match for this expert crew. We had an exceptionally smooth docking, despite it being Alex's first time parking this year (!). We all agreed that this was a very special group of people—I for one am so impressed with how everyone stayed so positive, helpful, and appreciative of humor despite an arguably challenging passage. We'll all return home significantly saltier than we were when we left, a mark of a passage properly sailed.
Lessons and a Gift
The biggest lesson is the helm. The lesson here is that even if you don't think you can do it over and over again with no sleep, cold and damp, it has to be done and so it can be done. Flying fish are cool, dolphins are really really cool, but the coolest of them all are the whales. And most of all Alex: "Find your center Carla. Always know where your center is so you can come back to it". He means the helm but it applies to life as well.