Yesterday evening we were sitting down eating our Sunday pizza when the line went zing. After a good battle I landed a 12-15kg tuna – the biggest tuna we have caught so far on Sunday Island. The cockpit looked like a blood bath once we finished killing and filleting the big fish. Due to the heat in the cabin (34*C during the day and about 28*C over night) our fresh food does not last well, so our fresh food is limited to hardy items like potato’s, onions, garlic, and what can fit in the fridge. We ate our last carrot and cucumber yesterday. we now have a few plums, apples and lemons left.. enough to keep the scurvy away! (having pre frozen avocado and banana is a lovely addition to a smoothie too.). Our staple diet is from our dry stores – pasta, rice and beans. So a good tuna or Mahi adds to our menu beautifully.
Because of the delays cleaning the fish and cockpit our watches were about an hour out of sync, so we decided to conduct our third time zone change for the voyage. We are now only 30 minutes from French Polynesia time. The wind was a steady 15kts overnight, and in the morning started to lighten off. At midnight when I came on watch I saw a light on the horizon to the south, and over the next few hours the light got closer until I could tell it was a sailing vessel. I gave them a call on VHF and they reported that they “SV Aneil”, with 4 Swiss sailors onboard. Aneil is a Cal 45 from the USA, and we were sailing faster than it, so as they passed astern we passed our regards and sailed onwards.
By 10am this morning the wind dropped below 10kts, and our boat speed dropped below 4kts. The batteries need a good charge and we need to make a good quantity of water so we decided to run the engine for the first time since getting into the trade winds two weeks ago.
After a great lunch of Sushi and ceveci the wind swung to the SE, so we hoisted the Code-O. The wind is still under 10kts though, so we are motor sailing and making about 6.5kts. The Grib file shows the light winds for the next few days, which I assume is the ITCZ pushing its way to the south, but I do not have a large enough overview to confirm this as our weather fax program requires an update.
After lunch we hooked a nice sized Mahi Mahi, but unfortunately the line broke as I was trying to bring it onboard. I have since modified the gaff, and the line is back out ready for our next victim. Also our brown boobie has not returned to Sunday Island (thankfully) so we can start cleaning its mess from the deck.
Weather is getting more difficult to download on the HF, and the blogs are getting harder to send. We are now using a HF Winlink station AH7L 3000nm to our north in Hawaii and the environmentals are only good for this in the early morning, so our blogs and position reports will be delayed for the remainder of our voyage – if we are able to send them at all. I look forward to tomorrow’s weather GRIB, as the weather seems to be changing quite radically at the moment and quite hard to predict. Quite typical El-Nino conditions for this part of the world, and not helped by the high sea temperature which is now a sweltering 29.2*C, combined with an outside temperature of 34*C making life onboard bloody hot! I would love to sit in the freezer for 5 minutes but it’s full of tuna (and not really big enough for me!). Jokes aside it’s bloody hot.. did i mention – it is hot? The temperature we can deal with, but we don’t have enough diesel to motor to Hiva Oa, so hopefully the wind scenario looks better for us over the next few days. If the weather remains as forecasted our ETA into Hiva Oa is this Friday, just in time for the weekend!
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