2216 UTC | 08° 10.72’ S 107° 23.94’ W
Sailing
I woke up this morning to a delightful smell and stumbled out of bed to find Mia making her famed hurricane eggs— obviously, a debate regarding the real name of this genius breakfast creation ensued. To make matters more exciting, a small tear spotted in the leech of the main shortly after breakfast had Alex up the mast Spider-Man style. A special shoutout to Vince—I have never seen someone cut sail tape with such precision and mathematical accuracy.
FALKEN is officially on the highway to the Marquesas, as Alex calls it, also known as the southeasterly trades. She is cruising along with the swell (finally) on her stern and the sails wing on wing. I wasn’t sure the term ‘highway’ could accurately apply to sailing until about five minutes ago, when Kate surfed down an above average wave and reached 17.6 kts of boatspeed. I can confirm that down here at the nav desk, I certainly believed that I was on a highway to something.
The yankee is rigged to the pole, which means I’ll finally stop tripping over it every time I go to the foredeck. It’s been an eventful past 24 hours to reach this point, and I’ve lost track of how many reefs I’ve put in and shaken out. I’m almost convinced that a few of them were just for Alex’s entertainment. The breeze is ever present but constantly in flux, and in a way, I find it strangely comforting that it will never fully make up its mind.
All is well with the crew—we’re enjoying conversations ranging from European bears (they exist, right?!) to electrolytes to sea stories. Some of us even laugh at Ken’s extraordinarily niche jokes. Flying fish constantly zip just above the surface, raising questions of what could possibly be chasing them down below. We’ve stopped keeping tally, but many have found their unfortunate end after flinging themselves onto FALKEN (or worse, straight into Beven).
As for me? I’ve found myself most in awe at night, when bioluminescence sends glimmers of wave crests across an otherwise dark expanse. I’ve seen more shooting stars than I thought physically possible, and I love how Venus is always the first bright spot to appear in the sky as the sun sets. I’ve been thinking much about how space must not be all that different from the open seas, empty and incomprehensible from afar but alive and intricate once you zoom in. I find myself smiling as I realize it’s no surprise those who explore space were named after sailors.
Love to all,
Zoe Peach-Riley (Apprentice)
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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.