February 14, Day 6 | Drifting in the Azores High – A Perfectly Imperfect Ocean Crossing
Adrienne II, our trusty Swan 70, is cutting through the Atlantic on a dream passage from Sint Martin to the Canary Islands. Well, cutting through might be a stretch—positioned smack in the middle of the Azores High, the breeze is nonexistent, the waves are barely a ripple, and the current? Forget about it.
Woke up after my night watch to a glassy ocean and couldn’t resist a refreshing dip—nothing like an Atlantic swim to wake up the bones. With the still conditions, we took the opportunity for a complete wash down, and now we’ve got a squeaky-clean ship, inside and out. Feels good to have the salt rinsed off, and morale is as fresh as the decks.
We’re still making progress, now clocking close to 900 nautical miles under our keel. The crew is in good spirits, and life onboard is everything we’d hoped for—fair winds (when they show up), great camaraderie, and a ship that runs like a well-oiled machine.
That said, the sea has a way of keeping you on your toes. Today’s curveball? The fridge has called it quits. Not exactly ideal in the middle of the big blue, but thanks to some quick thinking and a well-stocked freezer, we’re improvising with ice to keep provisions from going south. No crisis yet—just another chapter in the adventure. Spirits remain high, and as long as we keep pointing in the right direction, all is well aboard Adrienne II.
- Lars Vegard Guttormsen, Crew Member, Adrienne II
crew@59-north.com
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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.