April 9

We continued through the night wing on wing on a heading of about 175M - the wind began to move more to the N and less East. By morning it was determined that we needed to gybe and head more West . Our desired course was 235M and we felt we could fetch that easily on the other tack.

We had difficulty bringing in the genoa as it was stuck somewhere. Having no luck freeing it we instead retracted the whisker pole and left the genoa partly extended. After the gybe it turned out the genoa was well for the new tack and so we left it there. We will need to deal with rolling it up at some point today however.

It is now 7:45am Local (Pacific time) and we are on a heading of 230M making a course over ground of 237M in 12-20k wind from the North. Seas remain lumpy with 8-10ft swells from the North. The skies are completely overcast again and show no promise of clearing.

At 3pm we are now on a heading of about 240M, the wind having veered around a bit to the East. We are making between 6.5 and 7.5k over ground and the skies have been about 85% overcast with, what they like to call in Seattle - "Sun Breaks". Winds have lightened a bit and are about 15k from the North.

At 7:40pm local time we are now making 7k on a course of 232M in high swells running 10-12ft. The skies remain completely overcast - we had a brief light shower earlier. Making dinner aboard this evening was a challenge (as the boat assumes various angles of level from 15 degrees to either side of vertical) and it was amazing the cook didn't drop something on the floor (we had pasta with eggplant and zucchini w/tomato sauce in case you are wondering).

At 9pm we checked in with the Pacific Seafarers Net as we have done every night out. Each night they call roll on a list of about 25 boats and collect positions, wind and sea conditions, etc. and make the data available to other boats, the weather service, the public (via the YOTREPS web site) and even to participating boats via email.

This evening I heard the report from a boat which had been ahead of us for 6 days. They had finally fallen behind. In fact, we had passed them only a few hours earlier but neither boat saw the other. After my check-in on the VHF and lo and behold, they were about 10 miles NE of us and we had a nice long chat about this and that. They reported they had been watching some lights a few miles ahead of them but they were no longer visible. That would be us making 7.5k to the SW. Adios amigos.

At 10:15pm local time (05:15UT) we are making 7.5k on a heading of 225M in about 15-20k wind from the North. The seas remain lumpy with the primary swell running from the North at about 10-12ft. The cloud cover is thick so no moon can be seen.