Night Light

When we left San Diego, the moon was in it’s last quarter and was rising right before sunrise, which meant that for the first 2 weeks of the trip we basically have had no moonlight at night. For our night watches we relied on headlamps while working the boat, and had the opportunity to enjoy incredibly bright and vivid starlight.

We now have a night light. For the last couple of nights we’ve enjoyed a half moon, and it has completely changed our night vision perspective. When you come up on watch now it seems like their is a big spotlight shining brightly down on the boat (Jenna’s words). It is amazing how bright everything has become due to the new moon. We don’t need headlamps, and we can’t see as many stars. We are really looking forward to experiencing next week’s full moon.

The time of our sunrise and sunset has shifted pretty dramatically as well. When we left San Diego, the west coast was on UTC-8 time. We (I) decided to keep that time for Sophie for the entire trip, but I somehow forgot to tell everyone else. We ran into a little problem a week ago when the clock on everyone’s phone “sprang forward” with the time change, but my wrist watch and Sophie’s clocks did not. Rich, Dan and Jenna all showed up an hour early for their watches and were a little annoyed. We sorted that out, remained on UTC-8 time, but now that we are 1,000 miles west of San Diego the times for our sunrises and sunsets have shifted over an hour. It’s still pitch dark at 6:00 AM Sophie time, but in San Diego at 6:00 we had already turned off the navigation lights. All of this will change tomorrow when we switch to whatever time the Marquesas are on.

And we will get there tomorrow …

Our current position is 08.09 s 137.41 w. This positions us 2717 miles from San Diego and only 151 miles to Nuku Hiva. We made 179 miles in our last 24 and have averaged 184.3 mile days over our last 6 days in our “let’s celebrate Richy’s birthday at anchor with the ice machine” push. That’s an average speed of 7.68 knots over a stretch of 1100 nautical miles. Granted, half of that involved an engine running, but have I told you lately that Sophie has 2 dishwashers and a washing machine? Speed AND comfort. This boat is SMOKING!

Not much else going on. We came within a mile of a rusty Chinese fishing boat yesterday. It was going in reverse.

Since we are so close to land we have decided it’s OK to take the electricity hit and are playing tunes on Sophie’s outdoor stereo system. The kids are dancing. Last night was Mexico night, and I made tacos with seasoned organic ground beef, organic refried beans and a black bean/corn/cilantro salad. It was our first five can meal on the trip, and I was told it was delicious. Also, we’ve received word that our SPOT isn’t working. It seems to be functioning on our end, but it might be having a weak satellite connection in this neck of the woods.

Finally, I think this will be my last blog update while underway on this leg of our little family voyage. Hopefully we can post a photo or two tomorrow from land.