March 5, 2025 | The Panama Canal is almost within sight. The lights of Colón are clearly visible to the crew of Falken now, the cargo vessels anchored in the deep water are no longer just smudges of light, and traffic has dramatically increased since departing the San Blas islands 12 hours ago. The engineering feat of the Panama Canal is almost within sight! When the crew join the boat I like to ask why they chose this leg in particular. For leg 4, experiencing the canal crossing was the overwhelming majority of answers; however, after 5 blissful days cruising the San Blas islands, I think they’ll go home with many highlights! They were like the desert islands you see in many cartoons, only with even clearer turquoise waters and very welcoming locals—providing opportunities for the purchase of coconut bread and the traditional molas. I’m yet to master the pronunciation of any of the islands, but I can verify they are all beautiful.
Our last day was spent at an idyllic anchorage in West Holandes Cays, snorkelling the very much alive reefs and executing halyard swings from the boat—probably not quite the normal 59N trip but we’re all enjoying playing cruisers! After a rather dismal forecast of little wind, we got lucky and found ourselves on a comfortable close reach averaging 8 knots. Wonderful sailing... not so great for my anticipation of a slow sail to coincide with a daylight arrival to the busy shipping lanes! Unfortunately, or fortunately, the wind died off a couple of hours ago and we’ve been ticking along under engine for the final few hours. Despite the peaceful sailing disappearing, the stars have stayed and everyone’s enjoyed viewing the Southern Cross and shooting stars.
Hard to believe we’re only just over halfway of this trip and the Pacific marks our end point. This will be my third time through the canal but each time it’s impressive to see what is essentially a boat escalator! Our crew have been incredible, a lovely culture is on board and all have been reading up on the canal. Dave’s promised a 400-slide PowerPoint show on the subject, which should keep us busy whilst waiting for our transit date!
- Mary Vaughan-Jones, FALKEN Skipper
FALKENCrew
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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.