Monday After early flurry of activity, no further sudden big wind increases - pretty steady wind from SSE at 12-15kt all day, veering slightly to S later on and S-SSW by end of night. Very rolly all day, with a good S 2m swell from astern - being goose-winged always enhances any tendency to rolling.
The grey skies of early morning slowly gave way to broken cloud over the day, with sun trying, and finally occasionally managing, to get through by late afternoon.
Clouds had mostly cleared away by nightfall to give a starry sky with a bright moon shining and giving a path of light across the sea towards us - very pleasant!
Spent a lot of time over the day, downloading and checking updated weather files. The big High to the E, that we've been skirting for several days now, will move soon, changing its shape and shrinking, and is likely to give very light winds close to, or on, our track over the weekend, so the question is how to avoid the lightest of the wind and how to keep moving by avoiding light headwinds...
I've also become very concerned by a deep Low forecast to develop just to our W, over Sat/Sun, with its associated Cold Front moving E across our path by early next week. I've been hoping to avoid getting too close to its centre, but looks as though we shan't be able to avoid the gusty winds and heavy rain on its Front. Hoping to make use of its strong W winds to get NE towards B.C. over next week. It's still quite a few days away, so the forecast could well change in the meantime - hopefully, for the better!.
Also spent time on emails and on the radio - still in contact with a few Nets but getting more difficult to make contact with cruisers in Polynesia and Fiji on their Nets. The frequencies/times used have been fine when closer but not at the distance away (and local time) that we are now. Set up a new regular sched on 7160 at 0730Z - chatted to Ivan, VA7IVN, in his lighthouse location near Port Hardy, and also to Andrew, VK2HBH, in Fiji - clear copy to both.
As day progressed, it got warmer - so we're not yet back into fleeces - far from it!
Tuesday 8:30am Tahiti/Hawaii time (Tues 1830 GMT) Cloudy start to day, sailing with genoa poled out to starboard still - goose-winged. Will change the pole over today - we need to be on port tack now, with SSW wind, and we're presently sailing 'by the lee'. Can't keep that up much longer, especially if wind veers a bit more, as expected, so need to gybe the mainsail quite soon.
No big ships are presently headed across our path - the next likely 'close encounter' events will possibly occur when we get further N and cross the shipping routes from the San Francisco Bay area heading W to Asia - mostly to Japan and China.
Downloading weatherfaxes now - from Honolulu - far better signal still than from Pt Reyes.
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While sailing around the world, I'm trying to raise funds to help support the superb life-saving work done by the RNLI (Lifeboats) in Britain each and every day of the year, regardless how bad the weather. In fact, the worse it is, the more likely they are out there, helping someone in distress - whether a swimmer, surfer, small boat or big ship, night or day, summer or winter, and it is a charity - no government funding - so they rely on our help to fund their intensive training and maintain their equipment.
It would be great if you would take a moment to click on the Lifeboats link here (https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/Jeanne-Socrates2), if you'd like to show your support for my efforts at sailing solo, nonstop, unassisted around the globe, trying to set a World Record as the oldest person to do so, by donating something towards the great work the RNLI do every day. If a lot of people put in even a small amount, it all adds up... Thanks a lot! If you can help, it will be very much appreciated. Let's see if we can reach my target!
(I hear that some readers might need to talk to their bank BEFORE trying to make a donation to the RNLI since many US banks routinely block foreign transactions unless
they are notified in advance.)
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1900GMT (= 9 a.m. LT = Tahiti/Hawaii time) - end of Day 314. We made 126 n.ml. DMG, measured in a straight line between the two 1900GMT positions.
Total distance covered from Victoria, B.C., to end of Day 314 (by daily DMGs): 26,181 n.ml.
Distances (are all Gt Circle, at 1900GMT): Cape Flattery LH (Tatoosh Island): 1353 n.ml. to NNE (add ~60 n.ml. to Victoria); Honolulu: 918 n.ml. to SW; Papeete, Tahiti: 3054 n.ml. to S; San Francisco GG: 1228 n.ml. to ENE.
Position, as posted to www.Winlink.org and www.Shiptrak.org (using my US callsign KC2IOV):
TIME: 2019/08/13 19:00GMT LATITUDE: 33-18.03N LONGITUDE: 147-08.92W
COURSE: 014T SPEED: 6.2kt
WIND_SPEED: 15kt WIND_DIR: SSW SWELL_DIR: SSW SWELL_HT: 2.2M CLOUDS: 90%
BARO: 1021hPa TREND: 1 AIR_TEMP: 29.0C SEA_TEMP: 32.0C
COMMENT: Sun trying to get out from overcast layer.