LIFE ON A HEEL
Saturday, June 21, 2025 | Life on a Heel
Day 2 of life on a heel and the crew are getting more used to it. The sea state—or the helming—has improved, and the number of times you get body slammed while trying to sleep has reduced, making it much more tolerable. However, I speak on behalf of all the staff when I say cooking at this angle sucks an incredible amount, and watch handovers between us usually involve some grumbling about upwind sailing.
Moaning aside, it is lovely. We’re sitting comfortably at 8-10 knots, and what have been termed “happy” clouds (fluffy and white) are the only things that occasionally block our nighttime views of the Milky Way. With the Southern Cross behind us and Polaris directly on the bow, we’re also fairly confident we’re going in the right direction. All things going smoothly, we should be reaching Oahu sometime on Sunday afternoon.
Glums and glows today were characterized by an appreciation of savoring the limited time we have left at sea—only one more sunset now! As always, there is an excitement about nearing land after a longer passage. Orie’s vivid description of a beef burger he once had (with accompanying photos) seems to have fueled several crew members’ dreams of them. A crisp apple and long, hot showers have been mentioned with longing more than once.
It can be quite easy to wish away the last bit of time at sea with those creature comforts to look forward to. I’m pleased to report that is not the case with this crew, and the day has been filled with smiles, punctuated by cackles from the helm as they send a particularly soggy wave over the cockpit.
373 miles to go!
- Mary | FALKEN Mate
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- Mia (shore support)
FALKEN|Skipper&Mate
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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.