44°46.3’N, 148°45.1’W
Thursday, July 17, 2025 | POS. 44°46.3’N 148°45.1’W
02:45 UTC / 16:45 Boat Time
More thoughts from the neophyte…
A few nights ago as we concluded our evening updates, I remarked, “So what should we do tomorrow?” It garnered a laugh, but as soon as I said it I realized that this, for me, unexpectedly and concisely captured the essence of an undertaking such as this. Once everyone knows the tasks that need to be undertaken and the watches have been set, you repeat—day in and day out—until the passage is completed. Clearly, there’s no way that you can NOT know this when you sign on, but for me, when the reality settled in, it was still a revelation.
One more day you stand your watches. You do your assigned tasks. You sleep. You read. You stare at the horizon. You marvel at the remoteness of your position in the world.
When you’re fortunate, as we are, to have great companions, the conversation is interesting and entertaining, but by no means continuous. Even with six or more people in the cockpit, there can be long periods of silence.
The bottom line is that it takes a long time to cross two or three thousand miles of ocean, even in a fast boat like FALKEN. But it’s never been tedious, never been boring, and even as we’re still underway, I’m in awe of the immensity of the undertaking.
Ken T. | FALKEN Crew
PS. If you read this blog and your loved ones are onboard, please write a comment here and we’ll send them over to FALKEN! - Mia (shore support)
crew@59-north.com
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A last hurrah
Under the dome of stars in a moon-less sky, each of us during our time at the helm used the most rudimentary celestial navigation, keeping a star or two lined up with the mast as a helper to following the heading range. It was a whole crew event to set the spinnaker, reef the mainsail and practice the heave-to in case of man overboard. Alex stressed that the key to success in all of these crucial activities is preparation. It was hugely satisfying to accomplish these tasks through teamwork. We share a constant good hearted back and forth full of stories, one-liners and comebacks that also means constant laughter.
One little bird!
Falken has almost rounded the Channel Islands and is cruising along splendidly about 100 miles offshore. Though several models predicted some slightly fresher winds today, we were met with a consistent 18-20 kts of pure bliss. It seems that from the moment we left the dock in San Francisco, there has been much laughter and conversation amongst everyone. The plan is to gybe in a few hours and begin our approach to Ensenada. As much as I do appreciate the jokes and intellectual musings, I equally appreciate the natural, silent moments we share at night, all of us on watch gazing up above to the shooting stars, constellations, and planets putting on their quiet show.
Birds and glows
The sun brought new wind and we were soon putting up the Yankee (jib) and turning off the motor. During the evening tradition of sharing “glums and glows” that follows the crew dinner, our Mate Ryan proclaimed it a “champagne sailing” kind of day. As Alex noted this evening, life goes by so fast that one of the very best things about his line of work is enjoying the passage of time in the slow lane of an ocean passage. But by tomorrow, the green blobs in the weather sailing app indicate we’re going to pick up some significant northwesterly winds and we’ll take them ever further south to the Channel Islands latitude. We’re all super excited for the knots to climb and to see Falken really run.