Upwind Beat
I’m sitting in the nav station while the crew are having some coffee on deck. Checklists are done, briefings are completed, and all that’s left to do is refuel before we head out to sea. I always have mixed emotions before slipping lines; it doesn’t matter if it’s for a day-sail around the Solent or to cross the Pacific, that pre-departure feeling is always there. I know that once we hoist the sails and set a heading, all the nerves and anxiety will disappear instantly, but until then I have learned to cope with these feelings. The crew are all very excited to be sailing in these waters. We have a few stoppage options on the way to Honolulu and an Equator crossing to get through first, but OMG, what a place to be doing what we love the most! We’ll keep you all updated as we go.
Lots of love,
Alex & the crew
laline96@gmail.com
View more passage logs
”For some things, we will never be ready.” - Moana 2
After 852 miles of open ocean sailing, the crew of Falken dropped anchor in Moorea's Cook's Bay—not with a quiet glide in, but surfing down waves in a squall, breaking speed records and cheering each other on through the rain. What started as a plan to "just dip a toe" into offshore sailing turned into something harder to explain: the worse the conditions got, the more alive everyone felt. Turns out the question was never whether the crew was ready—it was whether they even needed to be.
Kauehi conundrum
Kauehi atoll was always on the itinerary—until the forecast made it a gamble not worth taking. Squalls, bommies, a tidal pass, and no clean escape route: sometimes the hardest call in sailing is the one that keeps you out of a place, not in it. The Tuamotus will have to wait.
Hove-to!
Falken is too fast—a problem most sailors would kill for, yet here we are, tacking back and forth across the Pacific just to kill time. A rogue low pressure system south of Tahiti has stolen the trades and scrambled our timing for the tidal window into Kauehi's pass, leaving us hove-to 45 miles short of our target in the Tuamotus. Salt licorice, dream sandwich debates, and a philosophical question about mermaid reproduction are helping pass the night.