Commodore
March 1, 2023

Wednesday 1 March – the big day arrives!

Today we start our crossing of the Pacific at 1pm. I will start with a big shout out for Livvy Ripman’s birthday, a very faithful blog reader, who messages Han when the blog goes quiet for too long! Hope you had a great day Livvy and lots of happy birthday wishes from all of us.

We all had to be on board for our exit inspection, we were happy to be in the 8-10am slot, and we were eventually boarded by 6 officials, including immigration, the navy and the anti narcotics officer! We got our passports back but they couldn’t release our meat they had securely quarantined, it required a different official. In the meantime the sails were being prepared, we had a big scrub up of the sugar scoops where the sea lions had made such a mess and a general putting away of everything as there was a good wind blowing. Finally at 12 the officer came to release our meat, all the officials have been exceptionally polite and helpful.

We were ready and released! We just had to wait for the big Catamaran Mororo (from Mexico with 3 kids on board) to depart as we were so close to them. They were finally off and then we started bringing up our anchor. I wondered why the windlass (the motor that brings up the anchor) was struggling and making a different noise, it was quite windy but the chain was right under us, then suddenly Nevil, our new crew member spotted that we had hooked and brought up an enormous rock. Bigger than I could put my arms around. I tried dropping and lifting to shake it off but it was solidly jammed. Nevil immediately got some rope and said he would climb over to tie it on and I should keep an eye on him incase he fell in! Before I could stop him he was climbing down the anchor chain with his legs in the water, he got the rope tied to the anchor and then onto the bowsprit and we managed to tilt it off. What a dramatic start, but so easily resolved thanks to Nevil’s quick actions. Out we went into the bay with the rest of the fleet doing the same thing, hoisting sails and listening out for the Yellow Shirts countdown. On the dot of 1pm we were all off with a good breeze behind us, the next adventure had begun.

It wasn’t long before all the colourful spinnakers were out and the race had started! Well everyone claims they are not racing until everyone is desperate to be out front! It wasn’t long before we heard that the other British Oyster Mistral could not lift their anchor and had to get divers in to get their anchor free, so they had a very delayed start. Thank God we got ours up! About 4 hours in we heard our friendly Dutch boat Pippin had to return to town as their engine was letting in water. The Arc and Agent have organised a mechanic and help for them, but sounds like it could be a bit of a delay.

Rowan finally got Scary our big Asymmetric spinnaker out, we haven’t had it out in ages, but luckily it went up like a dream and powered us on. Much to Rowan’s delight we managed to overtake the 72 foot Oyster Isabel, they also had a huge spinnaker but must weigh a lot more than us. In all of this excitement Nevil put his fishing line out which he had brought from Switzerland. He has set up an ingenious little system that unravels a flag when the line goes taught. He had a few bites and the fish got off until he finally got a tuna. Luckily he is obviously very good at filleting and cleaning as it was soon in ziplocks in the fridge.

The girls made a delicious stir fried vegetable dish and it wasn’t long before everyone was in bed and I was on the first shift which coincided with the wind completely disappearing and we had to turn the motors on. We have struck the doldrums long before the weather forecaster predicted!