Pacific Ocean – Southern Hemisphere 15 April 2010 09.1385S 137.7574W

Before we arrive and I disappear into landfall life again for awhile, I wanted to share a few observations, tales and details that I just haven’t had time to write up.

That Blue has changed to a slightly lighter, greener, or turquoise color, at first I wasn’t sure, then I thought it was my own eyes, then Frank mentioned it looked lighter to him, and the kids confirmed. So we have agreement on board, That Blue is different.

For the past few days we’ve been starting to see little black Noddy terns (io pronounced eeh-oh in Tahitian), and the masked boobies are back.

The flying fish down here are giants, and we all keep mistaking them for birds. Their landings are no longer little splishes, but big kersplashes (giving the fishermen false hopes for a tuna school). I thought their tail acted as a rudder, but it looks like they use it not for steering, but to give themselves some extra acceleration when flying, they periodically brush the surface of the water with it, vibrating super fast, and they then catch more air. It’s a turbo tail. These guys can stay above water for huge distances. This morning we watched a boobie try to chase one down on the fly, it was close, but the flying fish won. He must have flown 300-400 yards.

I also did not mention that fishing has been good, but we have not done a whole lot of it. We’ve been running the refrigeration just enough to keep things cold, not frozen, so we have to eat whatever we catch within a couple days. So after a catch we take the lines out for a couple days. One 30 pound tuna can last a long time! Unfortunately, right now we’re going too fast for Mahi Mahi (Dorado) my personal favorite. Frank has some lines he made of 200# test tied to thicker nylon string which is wrapped around these heavy black rubber bungie things which soften the impact of the first strike. The lure is a large two pronged barbless hook with a colorful plastic squid skirt hiding it. When we catch something he or Logan just pulls in the fish by hand. We’ve used these same two setups for 15 years and caught lots of fish up to 30-40 pounds. Yesterday Logan let out a “Woah” and we heard a snap. Something very big hit, and it snapped the entire getup back at the rail where it was tied on. All that’s left is a little two inch segment of the chord, and a frayed end. Good thing we hadn’t attached it with cable, or it might have taken the whole radar arch. Frank of course has relevant fishing tales to go with every fishing event. Yesterday’s loss reminded him of the time he lost both of the wooden outriggers on a fishing boat to a school of 100 kilo Tuna hitting the multiple hooks on the outriggers at the same time. They then got out the rod and real and managed to catch just one 240 pound fish, it took them 2 hours (four guys taking turns) to wear it out enough to bring it on deck. Not very efficient fishing he said. So there are some leviathans out here still. I’d be happy with a little 4 meal sized Dorado, I’ll leave the Costco sized fish for boats with more refrigeration.

Winds had lightened up a bit today, so Frank raised the spinnaker. I thought we were going to ease up to time our arrival, but with the lightening winds, we don’t want to end up motoring tonight (and since when could Frank resist a chance to fly the spinnaker). So he’s up hand steering now, since the wind of course did not stay light. We have officially caught up with the front pack of the Pacific Puddle Jumpers fleet. We have our first boat in sight 4 miles ahead of us.

We expect to make landfall tomorrow morning early.

Happy Tax day! xoxomo